
Class Ikl4L_ 
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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT 




THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 




I ife in Southern Fr 



The 

American Woman 

Abroad 

Written and profusely illustrated 
by 

BLANCHE McMANUS 




NEW YORK 

DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY 

1911 












A 1 



6 



Door « ANX 









&• 



■ 









FOREWORD 

The American Woman needs no introduction abroad. 

Always she is the most welcome of the throngs of 
self-invited guests who attend the great annual " At 
Home " which the European world holds for the visit- 
ing strangers, an entertainment that is becoming an 
all the year around function. 

All that Europe has to offer is hers on call, so long 
as she radiates that graciousness and appreciation 
which everywhere distinguishes her — the most viva- 
cious and distinctive feminine personality of all the 
women of the world to be seen on the European Play- 
ground. 

To the American woman abroad is due the credit of 
having so far influenced the conventions and traditions 
of the Old World as to have it recognise and accept 
with good grace (in so far at least as her own actions 
are concerned) a new standard of feminine conduct — 
freer and more independent than its own, but none the 
less modest and self-protective. 

The scheme of the following chapters is that of 
discursive comments on the more intimate and per- 
sonal phases of life in European countries which might 
be of interest to the American woman at home or 
abroad; whether she is the casual summer bird of 
passage across the Atlantic, or is planning a house- 



vi FOREWORD 

hunting tour of Europe, or only wants to read about 
it comfortably at home. 

In this book, it is hoped, will be found set forth 
fairly and correctly the results of the observations of 
one who has tried to study the values in the foreign 
picture with an open mind. 

Toulon, France. B. McM. 





'Em 



onfenfs 



V 

VI 

VII 

VIII 

IX 

X 

XI 

XII 

XIII 

XIV 

XV 

XVI 

XVII 

XVIII 

XIX 

XX 

XXI 



CHAPTER PAGE 

I The Cost of Living Abroad . 3 
II Servants and the Servant 

Question ... 33 

III Foreign Markets and Marketing 63 

IV Some Housekeeping Experiences . 89 
The Lone Woman Traveller . .133 
Tips and Tipping . . . 157 
The European Shopping Tour . 179 
Clothes and the Woman . . . 209 
The Men Dressmakers of Paris and 

London . . . . . .231 

The Social Side . . . . .251 

Cities of Pleasure .... 269 

The Country Hotels of Europe . 299 

Woman and the European Hotel . 329 

Light Refreshments .... 353 

The Woman Traveller and the 

French Cafe . . . . • 37 1 

Some German Spas .... 391 

Artists' Sketching-Grounds Abroad . 409 

Winter Sports in Switzerland . . 439 

The Woman and the Car . . . 461 
The Touring Club de France and 

How It Aids the Traveller . . 483 

French Law for Foreigners , . 505 




Villa Life in Southern France 

Frontispiece 



The Water Supply . 

Birthday Gifts 

A Mediterranean Market 

A Blanchisseuse of Normandy 

The Way Around Algeria 

When the Native Lady Goes Shopping in North 
Africa ..... 

Society Dines Out of Doors . 

On the Riviera .... 

On the Cote d'Emeraud — Normandy 

Hotel Garden — Montreux 

The Hour of the Aperitif 

Dejeuner — Hotel Bellevue les Andelys 

From the Point of View of the Cook 

A Country Hotel of France . 



FACING PAGE 
20 



38 
76 

Il6 

v 
142 

I90 
262 
276 
306 
332 
378 
4l6 
468 
490 



LIVING 







ABROAD 



THE MYTH OF CHEAP LIVING ABROAD 
COST OF LIVING ADVANCING ALL OVER EUROPE 
RESPONSIBILITY OF THE AMERICAN INVASION 
KEEPING DOWN THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 
HOW THE FRENCH LANDLORD RAISES THE RENT 
ITALY AS A WINTER HOME 
" PALACE HOUSEKEEPING " IN ITALY 
BUYING WOOD BY THE POUND 
PARIS APARTMENTS 

PRICES GO UP IN FRUGAL GERMANY 
TIPS INCREASE HOUSEHOLD EXPENSES 
LONDON FLATS AND " MANSIONS " 
LIFE IN LONDON CHAMBERS 
A BOUT WITH THE BRITISH WORKMAN 
THE COST OF SMALL THINGS 
CAFE-AU-LAIT WITH DINNER 
" DEMORALISING AMERICAN DOLLARS " 
WHY AMERICANS ARE OFTEN OVERCHARGED 
MODERN VILLAS OF EUROPE 

THE AMERICAN WOMAN IN THE SMALL RURAL COM- 
MUNITY 
THE AMBULANT BATH TUB 
EXCUSE FOR LIVING IN EUROPE 
REAL CHARM OF LIFE ABROAD 



THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 

To a man is due the discovery that one can live 
cheaply abroad, because one can wear his, or her, old 
clothes. This, brought down to the last analysis, 
precipitates the fact that cheap living in Europe is 
made possible by what one goes without, and the 
willingness to do things abroad that one does not 
like to do, or will not do, at home. 

No greater myth exists, in so far as its practical 
application to the majority of cases goes, than the 
belief that living abroad, which is taken to mean 
living in western Europe, for the American, is cheap. 

The majority of Americans who try it make the 
excuse that it is for economical reasons, but as a 
matter of fact it is more likely to be a desire for a 
change, or from the ennuis of the servant question, or 
that they just want to take a rest. They have heard 
the usual tale of how everything costs just half of 
what it does at home. It is a good chance for one's 
children to acquire French or German or dancing or 
art or some other accomplishment at the same time. 

Friends who have gone before may have brought 
back stories of heatless and waterless houses, but it 
is difficult to bring this fact and just what it means 
home to the average American housekeeper who has 

3 



4 T: MERICAM WOMAN ABROAD 

ithout all of the mechanical conventc ices 

that the ingenuity of a resourceful people have been 

the housekeeping question. 

Hie A ■ . . who finds the problem of 

high it home ever perplexing her. will find it 

duplicated in many phases on the other side oi the 
p. It is a common assertion oi late that Amer- 
- -... • .. ■ :. do with the increased cost of 
living : . but this is probably giving them undue 

prominence in the I I gtl scheme C IgS 

In the las: ten 5 the COSt oi living all over 

meed sorm I m - as much as fiftj 
cent, and in sonic cases a hundred would not be 
extravagant an estimate, and while the economic 
cause for this lies far beyond the circumscribed round 
oi the tourist traveller, it is true that the higMn 
gh*sp< . ig t vn . From America must bear the 
nsibilitv some of the increase in prices, in so 

far as th. the -granger on the Continent. 

Thus it is when the American worn.: I gOCS hunting 
in a Eur. capital for things on the same 5 

as she has them at home, she will rind that it I 
her just as much, p nately even more, than 

the same thing at home, and. to use I "shamrock " 
phrase, it is not the same thing either, very often not 
even :i, while unfamiliarity with tor- 

household economics completes the demoralisa- 
tion. The experiment is apt to be brief, and a year 
or two rinds the family back to the delights of veranda 
life in some comfortable American suburb. 

There is only one way to live cheaply abroad — 



THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 5 

Jive as the people of the country live. Not until one 
does this is any economy possible, or enjoyment. For 
most of us that is just the rub. It means making 
over one's tastes, habits of body and mind, and if 
this is to be done at all, one must begin young or 
be born a philosopher, and however numerous may be 
a woman's virtues, equanimity, under a new set of 
laws governing daily life, is rarely one of them. 

Anywhere outside of the large city modern con- 
veniences can rarely be found at any price, and 
where they are creeping in, have increased the cost 
of living out of all proportion to their benefits. 

Take as an example a certain French town of a 
hundred thousand inhabitants. A few modern apart- 
ment buildings have just gone up — the most desira- 
ble in the town. An apartment of eight rooms rents 
for say, two thousand five hundred francs (five hun- 
dred dollars) per annum; dear enough for a provin- 
cial town. There is an elevator of a kind, but the 
tenant must, in addition, pay five hundred francs a 
year for its use, besides an extra hundred francs 
to have the garbage removed and something more 
for the lighting of the public halls, besides a " fur- 
niture " a n d a door and window tax. It is the Euro- 
pean system of extras that runs up the bills. An 
economically inclined French family might insist on 
using the stairway, having been accustomed to noth- 
ing else, but, as a matter of fact, the system as out- 
lined, is only an ingenious way of raising the rent. 

Florence is one of the most popular European 
cities that attracts the prospective housekeeper on the 



6 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

other side, principally because the fact is well adver- 
tised that it has one of the largest English-speaking 
colonies, which alone makes for advanced prices, 
and then they are drawn there by the lure of Italy. 
Apartments are called cheap there, and five to seven 
rooms, at from twenty-five dollars to thirty-five dol- 
lars a month, can be gotten furnished. But the 
.American shivers in marble halls, which the small 
stove or open fireplace can as readily warm as they 
could an ice plant, and if there is a calorifere, or 
any system of central heating by steam or hot water 
in pipes, it is but a makeshift, except only in some 
of the great modern hotels in which steam heat has 
been installed on a lavish scale. Next to the un- 
limited use of water nothing is considered so extrava- 
gant as heat. 

Americans flock to Italy, impelled by the tradition 
that comes to them by way of England that Italy has 
a good winter climate. Northern Italy has probably 
the worst winter climate of all the Mediterranean 
countries, inasmuch as it is rainy as well as cold. 
All of southern Europe seems bitterly cold to the 
American, and the universal stone houses, always with 
marble, stone or tiled floors, seem like sepulchres. 
Frequently there are no fireplaces at all, and where 
they do exist are most inadequate. 

What may be called "palace housekeeping" is 
one of the most common forms of living in Italy. 
As few of the Italian nobility 7 are in sufficient funds 
to keep up their hereditary palaces of a thousand 
rooms, they are practically turning them into apart- 



THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 



ment houses, the great size of the edifices lending 
itself to the sheltering of several households, which 
after all is going back to their original purpose, 
wherein each member of the family when married 
was apportioned cer- 









tain accommodations, 
an apartment in fact, 
under the paternal 
roof. The price for 
one of these palace 
apartments is gov- 
erned by their loca- 
tion and the impor- 
tance of the family 
who formerly occupied 
it. In Rome and Flor- 
ence they command 
from five hundred dol- 
lars up to two and 
three thousand; as an 
additional inducement 
one often has the satis- 
faction of living under the same roof with a princely 
landlord. 

Such a palace apartment might mean anything 
from ten to forty rooms, furnished with a certain 
amount of antique fittings, slightly moth-eaten and 
damaged, to be sure, but not more so than the for- 
tunes of the family. Principally an apartment will 
be made up of a series of great reception rooms, with 
dim, cobwebby corners and much tarnished gilt and 




8 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

painting. The marble floors, to be properly cov- 
ered in order to ward off the chill, would need the 
contents of a rug emporium. The bedrooms will be 
thrust into any dark nook, but this is one of the tenets 
of the old and new Italian indifference to hygiene. 
Frequently there is nothing to suggest plumbing, even 
in its most primitive form. In winter, the Italian 
expects an earthen scald'im filled with glowing ashes 
to heat a room thirty feet square, or perhaps an in- 
efficient iron stove that radiates more coal gas than 
heat. One American is known who collected as 
many scald'im as possible, and making a circle of them 
and sitting in the middle, was thus able to keep fairly 
warm. Another with a screen shut off a small 
eighteen-foot corner, and, in a measure, accomplished 
the same thing. 

An apartment in Venice is a charming experience 
in warm weather, but when the snow flies through the 
beautiful colonnades, — Oh, no! In a Venetian pal- 
ace (one cannot get away from palaces in Italy) 
there will, likely enough, be found a garage for a 
motor boat under the back stairs, though it was 
originally built for a gondola, a species of craft 
which is becoming extinct before the invasion of 
modernity. 

There are possibilities in life in Italy if one does 
not go there under the delusion that it is a com- 
fortable winter resort. Even a palace is within 
reach of most Americans abroad, some sort of a 
palace at least, as might be expected of a country 
where a maid-of-all-work can be had for three or 



THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 



four dollars a month, and a butler for twenty cents 
a day, though the latter is nothing of the specialist 
that is his English prototype, for he will do anything 
from running the automobile to preparing the morn- 
ing coffee or sweeping out the apartment. 

One American couple who tried spending a winter 
on the shores of the Mediterranean, charmed by the 
novelty of life close to 
the soil, spent a good part 
of their income, and most 
of their time, in trying to 
solve the question of fire 
and heat. The only fuel 
to be had was the roots 
of olive trees, cut away 
from the living trunk and 
delivered in big baskets 
brought on the head of 
a sturdy southron and 
paid for by the pound. 
The local supply soon be- 
ing exhausted, contribu- 
tions were levied from 
the country round about, 
and before many weeks 
most of the able-bodied inhabitants of the little town 
of a thousand souls were engaged in the hunting 
down of a supply of burnable wood. 

These Americans, naturally, it being their first 
wrestle with conditions abroad, insisted on keeping 
warm. We, who had passed this first acute stage, 




io THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

knew how impossible this achievement was, and had 
given it up long ago. It was like foraging for an 
army corps. Finally the mayor formally waited 
upon them, and said that the olive crop was in danger 
and the wood would have to be imported from a 
neighbouring commune at increased cost, whereupon 




the couple gave up the struggle and went back to a 
Paris hotel. One of the traditions of that little 
community to-day — the story that is told to all new- 
comers — is about the crazy foreigners who burnt 
ten dollars' worth of wood a week. 

It is thus shown that in the most primitive en- 
vironment the cost of living can only be kept down 
by doing as the native does when he wants to keep 



THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD n 

warm ; sit on the sunny side of a wall with one's feet 
on a chaufrette full of hot embers. 

This is not what most Americans want, even 
though conditions may not always be so onerous, so 
it's either Paris or London for most of them, or 
Berlin, which has leaped into American favour with 
much vividness since the German Emperor has in- 
cluded so many Americans on his visiting list. 

Paris as a dwelling place for Americans abroad 
is still in the lead, and an apartment in the " City 
of a Thousand and One Nights " is still the acme 
of enchantment and the acme of price as well. 

Circling about the Bois de Boulogne, the Quartier 
of the aristocratic Etoile, the neighbourhood of the 
Champs-Elysees and about the Pare Monceau, are 
the highest-priced and most luxurious modern apart- 
ment houses. Built in the style of modern French 
Renaissance, with much sculptured ornament, they 
are charming to look at and much more beautiful in 
adornment than most things of the kind else- 
where. Inside they are bien Frangaise, with an opu- 
lence of gilding, mirrors and cleverly arranged salons; 
they of course have the latest sanitation and bath- 
room installations, but prices will be quite as high as 
the same thing at home, if not more so, for there 
again will be endless array of small expenses and 
taxes which are always added to the rent in France. 
Even on this basis one may not always count on an ele- 
vator nor any general, or " central," heating system. 

Just outside the gates of Paris are to be had 
moderate-priced apartments, in Neuilly, Passy and 



12 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

other suburbs, where for twenty-five dollars a month 
or even less, five rooms and a bath may be had, the 
rooms large and airy, and really far superior in 
arrangement to a flat at double or treble the price 
in America. Sometimes such an apartment may be 
had heated, but after a more or less inefficient fashion, 
which the American will be obliged to eke out by 
individual fires, either in a stove, or by coal or wood 
burned in a grate. A point to be remembered in 
this connection is that all household supplies, even 
kerosene oil for the lamps, not to say butter and 
eggs for the table, are considerably less in price out- 
side the walls of Paris than within. The octroi tax 
is not levied outside the fortifications. 

These cheaper apartments are often occupied by 
a better class of people than would be found in Amer- 
ican flats of the same rental. The Continental habit 
of the central courtyard adds considerably to the 
facilities for making a satisfactory arrangement of 
the rooms in an apartment house. Halls and stair- 
ways are spacious and well-lighted, and, it must be 
confessed, they are usually better cared for than 
at home and the smell of food is agreeably absent 
from the public halls. It is possible that the hooded 
fireplace with which the French kitchen is usually 
fitted is responsible for this. 

Americans who come to Paris to settle for any 
length of time all seem to want to live in a fashion- 
able neighbourhood, and as near the centre of shops 
and life as they can. The same is true of the aver- 
age French Paris household of moderate means, 



THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 13 

hence apartment life is universal. Only millionaires 
and the blue-blood aristocrats of the Faubourg Saint- 
Germain, can afford to live in houses inside the gates 
of Paris. 

In the Etoile quarter a small, furnished apartment 
of four rooms, a kitchen and bathroom is not unduly 
dear at fifty dollars, but at this price it would be 
situated on the courtyard, which might prove noisy 
if garages for automobiles and stables for horses, 
at the disposal of tenants, were on the ground floor; 
besides a courtyard is usually a mid-day gossiping 
place for all the servants, and if there were no 
elevator, as likely enough there might not be, a con- 
stant going and coming on the stairs and through the 
corridors might prove a considerable disadvantage, 
to avoid which it might often be considered worth 
while to pay more. Still, the offer of such accom- 
modation is not unusual, nor is the price nor location. 

The glamour that hangs about the Latin Quarter 
induces many to forego fashion and the boulevards 
for the cheaper Rive Gauche, where the best moder- 
ate-priced apartments in Paris can be had. On the 
newly opened Boulevard Raspail are many modern 
apartment buildings that compare favourably with 
those on the other side of the Seine. 

Cheap living in Paris means existence in the con- 
ventional old-time Parisian apartment, whether it be 
on the " Right " or " Left Bank," the climbing up 
of any number of stairs (and French stairways are 
designed on long lines) with no bathroom, no mod- 
ern sanitary fittings worth mentioning, no dumb 



H THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

waiter to bring up your groceries and no steam heat, 
only expensive sticks of wood with which to warm 
up a Paris winter. The compensating feature is 
that a bonne a tout faire will do all the work of an 
eight-room apartment at forty francs a month. 

The entrance door may have a vegetable shop on 
one side, trailing out over the sidewalk, and a laun- 
dry on the other, and a cafe opposite that only gets 
into full swing at midnight. But isn't all this the 
picturesque Europe that we go in search of? 

The cost of living in Germany, once the most 
frugal country in which to make a home in the 
calculation of the visiting foreigner, has risen enor- 
mously in the last ten years. The increasing wealth 
in Germany makes for display and a luxurious style 
of living undreamed of in the old days even by 
wealthy Germans. First-class apartments in Berlin 
are the equal of those in Paris in price and elegance. 
Houses are rented on the basis of so much for each 
room, thus is the price of a house regulated by law 
beyond dickering. The housekeeper in Germany 
must get used to a rather irritating oversight of her 
domestic life by police, which rather makes one feel 
as if one is bonded out on good behaviour, and it 
behooves the American entering the field of home 
life in Germany to get posted as to the regulations, 
and observe them. They extend from the supervi- 
sion of one's servants to the regulation of the hours 
of piano practice. 

The police are Germany's real rulers, and their 
power is sometimes even greater, as, unlike most 



THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 15 

rulers, they come in close contact with the people. 
The increased cost of living has brought about the 
general practice of renting rooms with a German 
private family. This offers a solution of living on 
moderate lines to the stranger, and avoids the as- 
sumption of much serious responsibility. Life in a 
small town in Germany to-day is subject to no small 
extent to the advance in the cost of living, but can 
be made moderate enough if the lively American can 
stand the stagnation and deadly dulness and the rigid- 
ity of conventional social intercourse. 

Dusseldorf is one of the most charming and mod- 
ern of the smaller German cities. Its boulevards are 
as well laid out as those of Paris and are lined with 
spacious, attractive apartment buildings, but their 
rentals would certainly rise to the par of those of 
Berlin or Dresden. 

The cost of housekeeping abroad, on the Continent 
in particular, is affected not a little by the drain on 
one's purse by the occasional, and annual, tips. In 
France, the domestic poarboire is an item to be reck- 
oned with quite as much as that of rent and taxes. 
The concierge expects an honorarium when the tenant 
takes possession of the apartment, and this is not left 
to the tenant's caprice, but is based on a percentage 
of the rental, with an additional twenty to fifty francs 
at the jour de Van — New Year's Day. 

The first day of the new year brings a regular 
riot of giving of presents. Those who expect to be 
remembered are without end. There is the postman, 
the telegraph messenger, porters from the shops who 



16 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

may have brought your parcels during the year, the 
baker's boy, the milk woman, every one who has 
rendered the slightest service, to say nothing of the 
servants of the house. Every one demands a cadeau 
as a right, its value usually estimated on a tariff 
formulated by custom, and if you expect services to 
be rendered to proceed smoothly the coming year you 
meet the expected demands as nearly as your patience 
and pocketbook will allow. The petty graft of the 
poarboire is everywhere. 

Compared to the Continent, prices are higher in 
London, where apartments of the first rank are often 
grouped into what are called " Mansions," while 
anything under this in the scale is reckoned as just 
a plain flat. English people are aghast when they 
hear one mention a thousand pounds a year as the 
rent of an apartment in the neighbourhood of Hyde 
Park or elsewhere in the aristocratic West End cen- 
tring around Buckingham Palace. Such rentals are 
not uncommon, but do not comprehend anything at 
all to be compared with the modern ideas which have 
been incorporated lately into American apartments 
at a similar figure. 

In spite of the advantage that the flat possesses 
over the house as a labour-saving proposition, the true 
British housekeeper would much prefer the latter. It 
gives one a more substantial position, for in England 
there is still the feeling that life in a flat is a menace 
to the sanctity of the home. 

Life in London " chambers " has romantic associ- 
ations with the old Inns of Court and ancient and 



THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 17 

somnolent city squares, where one can live in the 
atmosphere of dead memories and associations, 
features that tend to add considerable to the charm 
of London for the American. 

Usually " chambers " are to be had at a cheap 
rental, but also with a few attendant disadvantages. 
In the Adelphi Terrace, a little backwater just off the 
Strand that the flood of modernising which is sweep- 
ing over London threatens annually to blot out, one 
can still hope to find vacant " chambers " in a house 
decorated by the famous Adam Brothers. Before 
the door, as like as not, will be found an iron stand- 
ard into which the link-boys once thrust their blazing 
torches. The whole Adelphi region is redolent of 
memories of Dickens, who in his youth played about 
the great storage vaults that burrow under the Ter- 
race from the Thames Embankment below. It is a 
quaintly interesting district. Here you may see a 
house once inhabited by Roger Bacon, and across the 
way is still visible a certain brass door-knocker which 
figured in one of Dickens' most famous tales. In 
almost any of these houses are to be found exquisitely 
carved marble mantels. The walls are of stone, with 
a dressing of wallpaper stretched over cloth, which 
wavers in ghostly fashion in the too-frequent currents 
of air, like the ancient wall-hung tapestries of a 
haunted castle. 

From the windows of many of these houses one 
may look out over the Embankment Gardens and the 
foggy stretches of the Thames. The Royal Chapel 
of Savoy is a near neighbour, and ghosts of Dickens' 



18 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

characters float around every corner. On a winter's 
day at four o'clock the muffin man, ringing his bell, 
still makes his round of the district. Muffins and 
crumpets for afternoon tea at twopence each are a 
pleasant interlude and quite in the spirit of this old- 
time atmosphere. 

Hereabout one ought to be able to find five rooms, 
distributed over two unevenly laid floors, for five to 
six pounds a month, which is not out of proportion 
for such genuine historic associations as the rental 
includes. To discount this there will be a lack of 
water, hot and cold, except that which flows inter- 
mittently from an adapted kitchen sink, and your 
heat, what does not go up the chimney, is all radiated 
from grate fires. In these old buildings there are 
no elevators, no dumb waiters even, and coal, wood 
and everything else must be lugged up the front 
stairs, though plenty of willing hands are to be found, 
and at a small price, to do one's fetching and carry- 
ing. Ashes and garbage must be carried down to a 
tiny, well-like courtyard, and within the week the 
dustman will come along to remove it, of course 
demanding a tip. You may ask why, but he couldn't 
tell you if he would, except that it is in accordance 
with precedent, the thing that governs all walks of 
English life. 

The tenants collectively contribute towards the 
cost of the lighting of the front hall and of the 
keeping of it clean, the tenants of each floor attend- 
ing to their own hall. 

The cost of living abroad is the cost of the small 



THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 19 

things of life, and it is their multiplicity that fritters 
away the time and temper of the housekeeper, more 
so in Britain than elsewhere. Laundry work is 
wretchedly done all over the British Isles and at 
prices quite up to the American standard, while the 
clothes come home of a shade that matches the Lon- 
don fog, and fresh curtains must be put up each week 
on account of this same phenomenon. Thus sighs 
the London housekeeper. 

Sub-letting is a common practice in England, but 
is sometimes prolific of dire annoyance. You may 
arrive some day at your sub-rented flat to find the 
bailiff in possession. The law provides that if the 
original tenant fails to pay the rent, that the upper 
landlord can attach the belongings of whoever may 
be living there at the time. There may be no re- 
dress, no extenuating circumstances, and you may find 
yourself in the unpleasant predicament of having to 
pay rent twice over in order to release your belong- 
ings. 

Of the smaller London flat much the same may 
be said as of those on the Continent. The various 
rooms are usually conveniently placed, and everything 
has not been sacrificed to the economy of space. The 
English still treat themselves liberally when it comes 
to fresh air. 

An inconvenient British custom is that the out- 
going tenant carries away the gas fixtures and the 
piping as well, and in Scotland the one moving out 
takes away even the grates. This of course pre- 
sumes that they brought them with them when they 



20 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

became a tenant; still the inconvenience exists for the 
incomer, and worst of all, he has to contend with 
the plumber for a period ranging anywhere from a 
week to a month, which of itself is discouraging; 
besides there will be damaged wallpaper and chipped 
paint, which means the introduction of various other 
classes of the British workman into one's daily life 
for a more or less extended period. 

The British workman, for whatever species of 
labour you have to call him in, is another one of 
the things that increases the cost and annoyance of 
living in England. He is the curse of the home and 
the home-maker, and in his most highly trained form, 
the most tyrannical labour unionist in the civilised 
world. He does his work in inconceivably uneco- 
nomical ways, for he is slothful and inattentive, and 
unabashed will ask you for a tip when he finishes, 
though more often you have to give him one midway 
in order to get him to finish, all the time running 
the risk that he will break an arm or a leg during the 
job, so that you will have to contribute towards his 
support pending his recovery. He will build you a 
house at his agreed upon price, but will ultimately 
send you in an additional bill for coal used in keeping 
himself warm while he was at work. When the 
British workman comes in at the door peace flies out 
of the window, while to get finished with him and 
get him out of the house usually means a process of 
law if the job is of any magnitude. 

For the moderate consumer living is dear in Eng- 
land, and cheap living, like everything that is cheap 



.-~kj 




The Water Supply 



THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 21 

in the tight little isle, is bad. One can live as well 
perhaps in London as anywhere, but one must be 
prepared to pay for it. In the last five years the 
necessities of food have gone up approximately one- 
fourth to one-third in price. One of the commonest 
of causes for this hoisting of prices comes from the 
demand for things exotic from America. Grape- 
fruit and even bananas a few years ago were un- 
known in London, now every one has them and pays 
the price. When the menu palls, many a London 
housekeeper goes to Jackson's in Piccadilly for 
American groceries (in Paris to Prunier's), and deli- 
cacies from overseas. The American will think it 
worth while, but she is doubling expenses, and, though 
the joy may be doubled, there will be a disturbing 
influence brought into life abroad which was not 
what she presumably came over for. 

Nothing inflates a foreign hotel bill so much as 
tampering with the menu, and the American woman 
abroad is the greatest of sinners in this respect; it is 
true, too, that she generally gets worsted in the pro- 
ceedings. Anything that attempts to alter the routine 
menu of a hotel meal affects prices as hydrogen 
affects a balloon. 

When an American party comes to table d'hote 
at a hotel in a large country town in France and 
orders cafe-au-lait, and wonders why such a simple 
request creates something near a riot, and why it 
usually comes to be served them when they are 
nearly through their meal, there's a reason. The 
head waiter goes to the proprietor with the proposi- 



THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

5 takes i of them to the kitchen, to 
m the wrath of th< - has boon inter* 

in the S* Lg dinner. 

indue* um eave bis sauces ig < make 

send the scullf to hunt up 

outsick - list the least bit annoyed, but 

c the whole dining- oom full of people has 

got tteresft - st nore so ^ hen the party 

es bo drink the concoct on With their , ; . 
The meml i s the part] themselves beg n bo 
der when the] COm< their bill, for the addi- 

.- will be quite a third of 
the total. The . shrugs his shouh i s 

tells them that ej want to take to-morrow morn- 

ig*s break st th dinner the night before that he 
: .s willing bo serve it that but that those who 

do th< . . ig mist pa] for it This they do, 

grumbling at the way foreigners stick Amer- 
icans. 

Another disregard for economy is to order a 

dishes the regular table d'hote bill, under the 

impress tnthat U be cheaper. In such a case the 

I be served and charged for at a 

iriably he mon than that oi the 

. gular dinner. 

Alt the palatial apartments and hotels which are 

going up in the cap tal - es the Old World due 

to the American demand, as is SO frequently claimed? 

ably thirty thousand Americans live in Par - 
- is derably less number in Berl as many 

in Lorn - iflux, or invasion, certainly has 



THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 23 

something to do with the demand for what the 
American first took to as luxuries, but soon came to 
consider as necessities. The lavishly convenient 
American way of living has had much to do with 
the change that has come over the European caterer 
to the foreigner. Now that he has learned the trick 
and is working on his own account, adapting it to 
his own needs, even though the pace be slow, it is 
still evident that it has come as a result of a first 
desire to please an American clientele. 

The patriotic Frenchman dramatically points to 
the big hotels which have gone up in Paris during 
the last few years, and exclaims, " It is for you 
Americans that these luxurious establishments have 
been built; it is you who are coming here in our midst 
and demoralising our own people with your dollars." 

There is no use in asserting that you only wish to 
make use of his beautiful and attractive land at a 
moderate expenditure of money, and that there are 
plenty of other Americans with the same modest 
desires. He will not look at it that way, perhaps 
he cannot be expected to, and for a fact, it is not 
at all improbable that the American invasion has 
done something towards increasing the expenses of 
the Frenchman's own cost of living, just as the pro- 
gressive Italian is beginning to complain that the sen- 
timental traveller refuses to regard his country in 
any other light than a " has-been." 

It is beginning to dawn upon the American, 
whether living or touring abroad, that things are cost- 
ing them more than the native who is doing the same 



24 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

thing, and bitter complaints are becoming frequent. 
There is some justice in this. Their demands are 
more exacting, for rarely, most rarely, is the Amer- 
ican content to take things as found, and often at- 
tempts to make over existing arrangements, result 
in advancing the cost. 

An American will pay fifty per cent more at a 
hotel and get no more of value than will the German 
or Belgian. Principally this is because she, or he, 
has, according to taste, sought to improve upon the 
menu or the service. Under such circumstances the 
custom of the hotel, naturally, is to cover this trouble 
with a blanket of higher prices. Another mislead- 
ing American trait tending to bewilder the European 
in his effort to cater to their wants is the wrath of 
the American over small impositions when he seems 
so ready, as a rule, to pay extravagantly for real 
luxuries. It is in trying to reconcile these extremes 
that many of the troubles that hamper the free 
movements of the American abroad arise. The 
average American will pay a straightaway bill meekly 
enough, but when a kur-tax is added at the end, and 
he learns that this is a local custom for the privilege 
of listening to the band while stopping at some Ger- 
man spa, immediate resentment arises; a grumble 
ensues, too, when lights and attendance are charged 
for. Still the foreigner with lower standards goes 
on wondering why one is willing to spend thirty 
dollars on souvenirs, which he knows are of no real 
value, and protests at the added trifle of thirty cents. 

Certainly there is a growing tendency to exploit 



THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 25 

the American whose very generosity and liberality 
have aroused the cupidity of a people who are un- 
trained to this easy, open-handed dealing. How 
often is the American seen to double some price with 
the remark, " that's not much," and a feeling that 
these " poor people have a hard time anyway." A 
Swiss child holds up a handful of wild raspberries 
to the window of a train which has stopped at a 
small station; she has picked them by the wayside 
and timidly offers them for a few cents. " Oh," 
says the impulsive American woman, " that's too 
cheap, here's a franc." The child understands the 
money if not the words. This is a pleasant little 
incident produced in the exuberance of a holiday 
spirit, but the lady should not complain when next 
she comes that way that her wild berries can only 
be got for a franc — it is she who has made the 
price. 

Does the presence of Americans cause an increase 
in prices? Take Carlsbad, one of the most popular 
" cures " with Americans. Last year there were 
some three thousand Americans who took the " cure " 
there and at Marienbad, its neighbour, and another 
three thousand or thereabouts passed through, stop- 
ping en route long enough to take the waters in 
some form or another and buy some specimens of 
Bohemian glassware as souvenirs. They must have 
left in the neighbourhood of five or six hundred 
thousand dollars as the total of their expenditure, 
including mere unnecessary trifles. It is this that has 
given Carlsbad rank as one of the most expensive 



26 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

places in Europe. American visitors to foreign spas 
are usually of the wealthy class. 

To live comfortably in a southern European 
climate, on the Riviera, is possible on almost any 
scale. A Riviera villa can be got for a year, often 
furnished, for the price of a month's rent of the aver- 
age New York apartment. The subject is treated 
in extenso elsewhere, and it is not intended to refer 
here to that super-luxuriousness with which the gay 
world of Paris and St. Petersburg surrounds itself 
in the magnificent and often palatial villas of Beau- 
lieu and Cap Saint Jean. 

Modern villas, for rent by the season, are going 
up all over Europe. In some of the Belgian water- 
ing places a small villa after the old Flemish style 
can be had for as little as two hundred dollars for 
the season, and in Switzerland, modern chalets, pat- 
terned after the genuine old thing, are being erected 
near all the great resorts. Rentals are by no means 
as low as in Belgium, the cheapest being perhaps 
four or five times the price. 

Where can one live cheaply abroad? Naturally 
this is more nearly possible in the small town, or in 
a purely country neighbourhood, but since the average 
American can only live happily in colonies this is 
usually not to be thought of. It is the exceptional 
person who has the courage to break away from the 
companionship of one's own people, and the incentive 
for doing so must usually be greater than the saving 
of a few dollars. Large numbers of Americans are 
going about Europe looking for rest and quiet," 



THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 27 

but their search generally fetches them up not too 
far away from the divertisements of more or less 
populous and lively centres. 

Put the average American woman into a little 
provincial community in a foreign country and it is 
like putting her in jail. Dependent upon local soci- 
ety for her chief entertainment the novelty of un- 
usual surroundings soon becomes stale, whether one 
is living in a restored feudal castle or an adapted 
farmhouse that has caught one's fancy. Like the 
amateur gardener with his plant, she pulls herself up 
periodically to see if she has really taken root, and 
is perhaps relieved to find that the roots have 
not struck in, and that she can, when she will, 
move on to a more congenial environment without 
remorse. 

To be happy living in a foreign land requires an 
absorbing occupation or remarkable inner resources 
in order to be able to cut adrift from a conventional 
home-land existence and adjust one's outlook to the 
viewpoint of the country. 

The way, then, to live cheaply abroad is to shun 
the fashionable neighbourhoods, particularly those 
which have been made so largely by one's own people, 
and to take an old house, or apartment, rather than 
the newest that one can find. After all, for what 
does one go to Europe for but the old? 

One should learn to walk upstairs, to patronise 
the ambulant bath that is brought hot to your door, 
the public baths, or learn the acrobatic feat of bath- 
ing in two inches of water in an exaggerated soup 



2S THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

plate. One should not worry over the kind of en- 
trance which the apartment house may possess, or 
what rank in the scale of fashion the neighbourhood 
may have. The actual question of surroundings does 
not make very much difference in Europe; one's 
social status is not reckoned or recognised by her 
geographical location, and anyway, the temporary 




sojourner should be glad to put it all down to the 
credit of new experiences. 

What really hides behind this excuse of the search 
abroad for an economical style of living is first of 
all a feeling that there should be an excuse for one's 
peripatetic vagaries. A money consideration can 
always be understood, but the pivotal motive is the 
same as that which induces one to turn from a noisy 
street into a garden of old-fashioned flowers. The 
charm of a more tranquil life, with simpler pleasures, 



THE COST OF LIVING ABROAD 29 

is an attraction which will often serve as a temporary 
excuse for one's not remaining amid their altogether 
too-practical home civilisation. 

It is for the American woman abroad to cherish 
this great market of charm and fascination, and above 
all not spoil it by introducing the extravagant modern- 
ities from which she is trying to escape. 




<2> 






SERVANTS 

and. ^ SK#: 
Servant Questiofl 

SIGNS OF UNREST IN THE DOMESTIC WORLD 

PRIVATE SERVANTS 

ENGLISH SERVANTS AND SERVICE 

THE ENGLISH HOUSEKEEPER'S POINT OF VIEW 

THE " LADY HELP " 

WORKINGS OF THE ENGLISH DOMESTIC MACHINE 

THE CHEAP BELGIAN SERVANT AND THE ENERGETIC 

DUTCH MAID 
FRENCH SERVANTS 

" BONNE A TOUT FAIRE " AND HER DUTIES 
FRENCH HOUSEHOLD ECONOMICS 
CUISINIERE AND VALET DE CHAMBRE 
RESPONSIBILITY OF THE FRENCH HOUSEKEEPER 
LOW MORAL STATUS OF EUROPEAN DOMESTIC 

SERVANTS 
PICTURESQUE NURSEMAIDS 
THE ARISTOCRATIC " NOUNOU " 
THE SOUBRETTE IN REAL LIFE 

SCHEDULE OF DAY'S WORK IN A PARIS HOUSEHOLD 
HARD-WORKING GERMAN WOMAN SERVANT 
GOOD, BUT UNSYMPATHETIC, SWISS SERVANTS 
HAPPY-GO-LUCKY ITALIAN MAID-OF-ALL-WORK 
PUBLIC SERVANTS 
CAFE GARCON 

PERSONNEL OF THE BIG EUROPEAN HOTEL 
VERSATILE HALL PORTER 



II 



SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT 
QUESTION 

There is a servant question in Europe. Students 
of domestic economics, reading between the lines, say 
that there are significant signs of unrest among the 
serving classes. To the uninitiated, however, the 
usual problems of domestic service seem largely non- 
existent; obviously, they have not passed beyond the 
stage of symptoms. Good, capable, abundant and 
cheap (according to American standards) servants 
can still be had all over Europe. 

Service is respectable, and often hereditary, and 
in the matter of treating servants, monarchial Europe, 
that is Continental Europe, is more democratic than 
America. In the middle-class European family, while 
the servants perform menial work of drudgery under 
conditions unthinkable in our land of super-conveni- 
ences, they are usually treated more as one of the 
family which they serve than here. It may be this, 
quite as much as tradition and need, that makes serv- 
ants contented with their obviously onerous lot on 
the Continent, and keeps them for years, or for a 
lifetime, in the same employ. 

From England come the most formal complaints. 
This is but natural in a land where personal service 

33 



34 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

has been brought so near perfection. The more 
nearly perfect a machine, the more noticeable any 
flaw in its operation. " Servants are too independ- 
ent," says the English mistress, " they are becom- 
ing more difficult to get, and every year are demand- 
ing higher wages." " They are spoilt," continues 
the housekeeper, forgetting that it is she who is the 
spoilt one. All this may be true, but English serv- 
ants are still the best examples of the personal re- 
tainer. 

The English servant has no wish to be anything 
but a servant. The process of " improving his con- 
dition " never goes beyond his desire for improve- 
ment. The apparent unrest simply means that there 
is a movement among the serving classes for an 
amelioration of the conditions under which they work 
more than anything else, for old-time conditions of 
servitude have been maintained on lines which are 
astonishingly near those of feudal times. The mis- 
tress of the household is even yet a dictator in her 
realm. What her servants wear, who their friends 
may be, limiting recreation, as well as their working 
hours, she controls absolutely, and, to all intents and 
purposes, their religion and politics are under strict 
surveillance. " As the Squire and the Vicar say," 
is still the creed of rural England, and in each of 
these instances it is the wives of these solons who 
have the regulation of the servant question in their 
charge. It is only recently that the housemaid was 
allowed to ride out on a bicycle, while over be-rib- 
boned hats, even on " evenings out," are still 



SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 35 

frowned upon. The English servant has been 
brought up to know her place. Little cause for won- 
der when she begins to define that place herself that 
the foundations of the English system of serving get 
a shock! On the whole, the feeling is strong in 
England against a servant forgetting her place. The 
English servant still has an ingrained respect for 
" her betters " in spite of the strides of socialism. 
There is a tendency creeping in that their children 
might seek to rise in the world, and this is what has 
shaken the nerves of the English housekeeper — that 
working girls should be allowed to look forward to 
any other occupation than that of going out into 
service as did their parents before them. 

It is the " board schools " that are unfitting the 
working classes for domestic service. This is the the- 
ory of the English housekeeper. " Board schools," 
that inadequate English form of a public school, 
have only provided compulsory education for little 
more than a quarter of a century, but the upper 
classes regard the plan of purveying education for 
the masses as the beginning of troubles that their 
grandparents never even suspicioned. 

The English first set the complicated and elabo- 
rate household machine to running smoothly, but 
now they must watch out that they are not caught 
in the cogs. English servants have formed themselves 
into a vigilant band of censors and expect their em- 
ployers to live up to their positions, incidentally re- 
fraining from bringing discredit upon them. Eng- 
lish servants having been trained by Church and 



36 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

State to the service of their superiors hold their 
superiors, in turn, up to their duties. They seek 
not only to guard themselves against encroachment 
from the competition of fellow-workers, but from 
their employers as well. Nothing so demoralises a 
servant as to turn in and do work one's self. Under 
such circumstances a servant would let you know in 
a politely impertinent way that you have demeaned 
yourself, that you are " no lady." She would much 
prefer being overworked herself to suffer the igno- 
miny of having a mistress who could so far lose 
sight of her dignity as to be willing to do any work 
that belonged to the province of her maid. No 
labour union was ever more ingeniously safe- 
guarded, and the mistress becomes a "scab" if in- 
clination or circumstance impel her to put her hand 
to more than the lever which sets the domestic 
machine in motion. 

A rather curious development, said to be the out- 
come of two things — the difficulty of getting general 
servants, and the necessities of a large class of " re- 
duced gentlewomen " — has brought about the rise 
of the " lady help," an anomalous thing, only possible 
in a land of compromise, such as England. The 
" lady help " will perform practically any duty, but 
the fact must never be lost sight of that she is a 
" lady." The etiquette varies somewhat, but she 
may demand that she have her tea with her employer, 
or even that she take her meals with them. Beyond 
this she is not usually intrusive. This new phase of 
the servant question has not been in operation long 



SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 37 

enough to test its practical working. The " lady " 
servant asks slightly higher wages on the ground of 
bringing a superior intelligence to bear on the do- 
mestic problem, but doubtless she counts somewhat 
on the value of her dignified position. 

Caste is as strongly defined in the servants' hall as 
in the drawing-room. There is no grade of English 
servant but what is able to, and does, look down on 
another, and the chauffeur or coachman (for whom 
the employer is taxed by the government for the 
privilege of having them at his beck and call) natu- 
rally feel very much above the scullion or the dairy- 
maid. 

In some respects the workings of the great houses 
are simpler than that of a more modest establishment. 
Where there is a housekeeper to whom all others 
must look, and who is responsible for the running of 
the house, the actual cares of the mistress are much 
lightened. It is a household within a household, of 
which the butler and the housekeeper are the heads, 
and hold positions of equal dignity. 

One just cause for the servant unrest in England 
is that arising from the economy of food. The 
larger the army of servants the more niggardly, very 
often, is the policy of the house towards the food 
supply of the servants' hall. The grander the estab- 
lishment the more diligently must small economies be 
practised, especially on the scale of the steadily de- 
creasing incomes of the majority of land-owners. 

English servants are better lodged than their fel- 
lows on the Continent, but that they are better nour- 



38 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

ished is certainly open to doubt. The food for each 
servant is carefully apportioned — just so many pounds 
of meat, bread, tea, sugar, milk, a certain allowance 
of the latter being for puddings, it being often ex- 
plicitly stated as to whether puddings for the serv- 
ants are to be milk puddings, or just " plain boiled." 
The careful housekeeper sees to it that not an ounce 
extra is ever given out. Each servant may demand 
a daily allowance of beer, or is otherwise entitled to 
"beer money"; this at least is the traditional pro- 
cedure, though not always enforced to-day. Any- 
thing beyond this regime is at the expense of the 
servant. Board wages — when the house is closed, 
the family being away — are usually allowed at the 
rate of ten shillings a week. What would the well- 
fed American servant say to being expected to live 
on two dollars and a half a week? 

The " Employers' Liability Act " has recently be- 
come a law in Britain and adds considerably to the 
complication of the domestic problem. If a servant 
is injured in service, even though it be through her 
own negligence, the employer is liable for an indem- 
nity. One insures against this by the payment of a 
cash premium, which automatically adds to what 
one pays in assumed responsibility. If wages are 
creeping up in England, they still seem, to us, within 
reason. A general servant at a hundred dollars a 
year, even if her ability as a cook is questionable, 
does not seem unduly expensive, and parlour maids are 
cheap from sixty to eighty dollars a year. It is in 
the aggregate that English service is costly. The 







Tbr-.S 

( Itot 



Birthday Gifts 



SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 39 

staff required to run an average house and family 
is from four to six — cook, butler and parlour maid (or 
two maids), scullery maid, gardener and chauffeur, 
or coachman, according to taste. The chauffeur 
adds another complication; he ranks above the old- 
time coachman, and holds himself high above the 
other servants, is usually catered for apart, and in- 
deed is the subject of special consideration all along 
the line. 

Far down on the long list of English servants is 
that peculiar London type, the charwoman, most 
lowly of menials, whose life is spent in the grimy 
labour which has been evolved as a result of the 
uneconomically arranged London house. For a shil- 
ling for two or three hours' work, she blacks the 
grates, carries coals up, and ashes down, many flights, 
and sweeps the floors on her knees with a handbrush 
and dustpan. Faithful in her work but untruthful 
in speech, kind-hearted and sloppy, coming to her 
day's work on the strength of only a cup of tea, 
making up deficiency on surreptitious " beers," she 
has, with true British pride, a wholesome respect for 
her work and the knowledge that there is some one 
still farther down the scale whom she may yet 
patronise. It is these qualities, after all, that con- 
duce to the still unchallenged superiority of the Eng- 
lish servant. 

English servants are trained for their careers. The 
cottager's daughter is taught to arrange a tea-tray, 
that a neat apron is a necessity, and that she must 
say " thank you, ma'am," though the old-fashioned 



4 o THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

bob-curtesy is a relic of the early Victorian period 
seldom seen. One may still run across it, but it 
only exists, like rare birds, in out of the way spots. 

The superior English servant radiates comfort, 
but one must be of her race to get the best results 
from her service. No matter how circumspectly the 
stranger, coming to England to make her home, 
models the conduct of her establishment on English 
lines, the attitude of the servant is slightly super- 
cilious. She is made to feel that she is not of the 
elect. 

Wages are lower all over the Continent than in, 
England. In France from thirty to fifty francs (six 
to ten dollars) is the wage of a general servant. 
In Germany it is less, and the work is harder. For 
cheap labour the Belgian woman is unequalled. In 
the matter of throwing pails of water about, and 
putting a shine on things, the white-capped Dutch girl 
has no peer, and works at a nominal price, though 
the stranger in Holland generally finds most things 
very expensive. 

Along with the fear of a diminishing population 
in France comes the scare of a famine in servants. 
The number of female domestic servants has been 
steadily decreasing in the last fifty years, so that there 
has been an influx of a cheaper kind from the more 
necessitous countries, notably Switzerland, Italy and 
Belgium. Still, the bonne a tout faire, the stolid 
peasant woman of the old French provinces, is the 
mainstay of the French menage. 

The average French household is economically run 



SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 41 

with but one general servant — the bonne a tout faire, 
or at most two — a cuisiniere and a femme de chambre. 
The servant in France is on a different plane from 
that of her English sister. Her relations with the 
family are more intimate, and she shares the family 
cares and pleasures alike, being really one of them. 
It would be impossible, in many cases, to compress 



— iL_J-L_ 




the expansive French temperament into the formal, 
impassive mould of the English servant. 

The French bonne a tout faire, the general maid 
of all work, is a faithful animal, a product of the 
fields of France; her only emotion is work, her only 
pleasure to lay by, sou by sou, a meagre dot in the 
hope that it will gain her a husband — that is if she 
is young. More often she spends her life in the 



42 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

service of one family, her small hoardings secreted 
in the traditional bank of a French peasant, the bas 
de laine. She cooks, does the ordinary wash of the 
family, sews, and mends all the family stockings. 
She rises at break of day and is the last to retire. 

Where there is but one servant the mistress is ex- 
pected to, and does, work side by side with her. The 
French servant would be more likely to think her 
mistress was not a lady if she did not turn her hand 
to the housework, and besides the French house- 
keeper is always a domestic worker, all except the 
real woman of society, a class which scarcely exists 
outside Paris. The bonne goes about her work in 
the morning in her petticoat; presumably it is for 
economical reasons, as she does not don her dress 
until late in the day. 

Where the bonne sweeps the room, madame is 
supposed to dust, to wipe the dishes and to help in 
the making of the beds and chamber work. The 
natural outcome of this is that maid and mistress 
are on a friendly footing. This brings up the ob- 
jection to the transplanted housekeeper from other 
lands of too much familiarity, and the friendly in- 
terest that is sometimes a real charm in the French 
servant might conceivably become an interference. 

As a French servant is charged for all the break- 
age, there is less of the usual slaughter of household 
crockery here than in England or America. 

The bonne a tout faire is paid from thirty to fifty 
francs a month, according as to whether she is in 
the country or the city. The Parisian servant com- 



SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 43 

mands the highest wages, though that of itself does 
not always imply the most capable service. The 
French servant is quite accustomed to a strict regime 
in spite of the social latitude which is allowed. No 
one practises small economies so well as the French 
housekeeper. It is she who carries the keys and 
everything is under lock. Every end of the loaf is 
accounted for and even candle ends are saved. 
Lumps of sugar are counted out as if they were coin. 
In spite of this the perquisites of the French serv- 
ant are openly tolerated, particularly that commis- 
sion on all household purchases, which, by unwritten 
law, amounts to a sou in a franc. Naturally this 
petty graft comes out of the household; the shop- 
keepers do not tax their profits to meet this extor- 
tion. Some effort has been made to counteract this 
custom, and at the same time reduce household ex- 
penses by allowing the servant a certain percentage 
on any saving which may be made in the household 
running expenses, such as heating, lighting and the 
cost of staples used in cooking. This implies a very 
good working knowledge on the part of the mistress 
as to the real cost of things, and in that way makes 
for a valuable knowledge of home economics. It 
is thus that wasteful tendencies on the part of serv- 
ants are controlled. 

The cuisiniere considers as her right this danse 
du panier, as it is called, and she will likely enough 
leave her employ if she is not allowed the privilege 
of going alone to market, or should her mistress 
watch her purchases too closely. 



44 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

A combination frequently seen in the French house- 
hold is the married couple, the wife serving as cook, or 
cuisiniere, the husband as valet de chambre. Divid- 
ing the work among themselves they are thus able to 
keep all perquisites in the family. The functions 
of the valet de chambre are intimate, but one gets 
used to a man-servant about the house after experi- 
ences with ship stewards, the silk-clad Arabs who 




Femma de Menace 



S-McM. 
Valet" de Cbambre 



glide about the corridors of North African hotels, 
and the Swiss-German who prepares your bath in 
the famous spas. 

The valet de chambre brings madame her morn- 
ing chocolate, places it discreetly beside the bed and 
retires; he valets monsieur, does the rooms, waits on 
the table, and in toto combines the duties of butler, 
footman and chambermaid. 

Where the combination is a cuisiniere and a femme 
de chambre, the duties of the latter are practically 



SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 45 

the same as those of the valet de chambre, except that, 
in addition, she has a certain amount of laundry 
work which she must also mend and keep in order, 
besides assisting in any plain sewing to be done. 
Under such an arrangement the cook is expected to 
take care of the salon and salle a manger, in addition 
to her kitchen duties and the marketing, which latter 
for her is really a recreation. Where there are chil- 
dren the femme de chambre is supposed to occupy 
herself to some extent with their needs. 

A housekeeper in France has great responsibilities 
attached to her position. Theoretically, she is re- 
sponsible for the moral conduct of her servants. Not 
only must she care for them in illness, but should 
any harm come to a young girl in her employ the 
parents could hold her responsible, the law regard- 
ing the servant as a member of the family of her 
employer. In Paris, it is true, this is virtually a 
dead letter, for the immorality of the Parisian do- 
mestic servant is flagrant. Any consideration of this 
aspect of the case is usually met by a shrug of the 
shoulders; the French are a cynical race; "if she 
is a good servant, what more could one ask? " 

The low moral status of women servants is gen- 
erally recognised throughout Europe as a result of 
the difficulties with which marriage is hedged about, 
though more probably in many instances it is as a 
result of the last feeble flickerings of a feudal system 
which took no account of the overlord's obligations 
towards a menial. Things are better in England; 
the moral standard among servants is higher, out- 



46 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

wardly at least, but there are sturdy, self-respecting 
working parents who say that the great country-house, 
with its gay week-end parties, is no place for a young 
girl. This is another phase of the servant question. 
A picturesque figure in Continental cities whose 
functions keep her in the eye of the public, is the 




Og-*V- M._ 



nursemaid, and to her is largely due the credit of 
preserving the national dress of her country. The 
Spanish-Catalan nurse wears the black lace mantilla 
draped gracefully over her head and held by long, 
gold pins, while in Italy the charming Neapolitan 
costume is the favourite livery of the nurse; the 
folded white head dress, the coral necklace, the laced 
bodice and apron, with its coloured bands, dress up 



SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 47 

the Italian nursemaid who still carries baby wrapped 
in the same style of swaddling clothes as those of 
the Lucca della Robbia infants. The English nurse- 
maid is a symphony in grey and white, with a close- 




E.ng)isb Nursemaio 



fitting black bonnet, with white floating strings, who 
must look continually immaculate on a pittance of 
from six to ten pounds a year. 

The profession of nursemaid in Paris is almost 
exclusively in the hands of the little Breton girls, 



48 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 



whose dainty coiffes, black dresses and silken aprons 
form the badge of the Parisian children's nurse. 
They are among the most reliable of French types 
of servitors, though rarely paid above ten dollars 

a month, more often but 
seven or eight. The 
" nounou*' the nursing 
nurse, is the aristocrat of 
the profession. With 
floating cloak and ribbon 
head-dress of bright- 
coloured streamers, her 
charge smothered in laces 
on a pillow in her arm, 
she is the most pic- 
turesque adjunct of the 
beautiful gardens of 
Paris. She is the queen 
of that portion of the 
Bois set apart for the 
use of children, undefiled 
by the automobile, a sym- 
phony in blue or rose. The " nounou " of the chic 
Parisian must be as dainty as her mistress, who 
furnishes her charming costume free of cost, includ- 
ing the ruched bonnet composed of many yards of 
twelve-inch ribbon, often of the value of her em- 
ployer's own hat. The " nounou " carries herself 
haughtily, but her very trade tends to a life of im- 
morality. A wage of twenty-five dollars a month 
is too strong a temptation not to keep her in service. 




SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 49 

The soubrette seems to us such a reminder of the 
stage that we rarely think of her except as tripping 
before the footlights, tossing her head under its 
coquettish cap, hands in the pockets of her berib- 
boned apron. The soubrette in real life, however, 
in the character of lady's maid, plays an important 
role in the social drama of fashionable life. Her 
intimate relations with her mistress often make her 
a confidante. No gay French farce is ever pre- 
sented but shows up the little soubrette, the guardian 
of the secrets of the boudoir, and the convenient go- 
between in the menage a trots. Such a play reflects 
the versatile functions of the soubrette with consid- 
erable fidelity. Madame often consults her maid's 
taste; as a hair-dresser she has no equal; her deftness 
with chiffons makes her an invaluable assistant in the 
intricacies of the toilet of the woman of fashion, and 
altogether she is one of the least to be spared of 
French feminine servants. 

The French lady's maid is most valued by the 
woman of the world, whatever may be her nation- 
ality. Even the Englishwoman replaces her more 
reliable, hard-working English girl with the vraie 
Parisienne when the purse permits. The exchange 
costs about fifty per cent more, but the English- 
woman considers that she gains this in " smartness." 
" The lady's maid as an economic factor in life is 
worth what she costs," says the Englishwoman; " she 
saves the small outside expenses." Besides the per- 
sonal service that she renders, the French maid usu- 
ally has a working knowledge of dressmaking and 



50 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

ought even to be able to run together a gown if 
necessary. 

The English servant still dies in service and is 
laid away in the village churchyard in the shadow 
of the escutcheoned tomb of the house she has served, 
usually so well, or it may be that she will have been 
retired on a pension. In France the State, so fond 
of giving decorations, more theatrically rewards the 
faithful servant by giving her a medal for a certain 
number of years of continuous service, also a small 
sum of money. Truly the servant question is great! 

The disposition of the time of the servants of a 
Paris household is usually about as follows : 

In a household of three servants, a woman cook, a 
butler and a chambermaid or parlour maid. 

COOK 

7.00 A. M. Preparing of the petit dejeuner and 
general making ready for the 
day's work. 

8.30 A. M. Marketing. 

9.30 A. M. Servants' breakfast, the preparing 
of sundry desserts for the mas- 
ter's dejeuner and dinner, and the 
cooking of the mid-day meal. 
12.00 Noon. Master's dejeuner. 
1 to 1.30 P.M. Servants' dejeuner. 

Afternoon devoted to the clean- 
ing up of cooking and eating 
utensils, dishes, etc., and the 
preparing of dinner. 



SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 51 

7.00 P. M. Dinner. 
8 to 8.30 P. M. Servants' dinner, cleaning of dinner 
dishes, etc. 
General cleaning. — Monday afternoons: kitchen 
and cupboard, windows, etc. Tuesday: the range 
and its appurtenances. Wednesday: cupboard shelv- 
ing, plate racks, etc. Thursday: walls, ceiling base- 
boards, etc. Friday: all brass and copper cooking 
utensils. Saturday: floors thoroughly cleaned, which, 
however, are usually washed down every day. 

BUTLER 

A. M. Make and light fires, polish boots, brush men's 
clothing, prepare the salle a manger for 
dejeuner, serve at table, etc. 
P. M. Lay table for dinner, serve same, clear away, 
and at ten o'clock make ready the sleeping- 
rooms. 
Monday morning: Wax and polish halls and one 
sleeping-room. 
Afternoon: Clean silver and copper and 
brass in dining-room. 
Tuesday morning: Clean thoroughly the salon, 

wax and polish floor of 
salle a manger, clean thor- 
oughly one sleeping-room. 
Afternoon: Attend callers. 
Wednesday morning: Polish furniture of salle a 

manger, clean thoroughly 
one sleeping-room. 



52 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

Afternoon: Clean and polish lighting fix- 
tures, windows and mirrors. 
Thursday morning: Clean thoroughly one sleep- 
ing-room. 
Afternoon: Clean and polish mirrors and 
fixtures of small salon. 
Friday morning: Wax and polish stairs and 
banis-ters, clean thoroughly 
bathroom. 
Afternoon: Clean brasses. 
Saturday morning: Clean thoroughly small salon. 
Afternoon: Clean thoroughly pantry cup- 
boards, trays, etc. 
At all times the butler is supposed to be able to 
arrange his work in such a manner as to be present- 
able for receiving callers. 

CHAMBERMAID (FEMME DE CHAMBRE) OR 
PARLOUR MAID 

Morning: Awaken children, serve the petit de- 
jeuner, clean lamps and fixtures, 
brush dresses of mistress, sew up 
rips or clean off spots if necessary, 
make up beds and put sleeping-rooms 
in order. 
Afternoon: Sewing and ironing. In winter close 
windows at sundown. Arrange beds 
for the night. 
Monday: Make up list of soiled linen for laun- 
dry and put that which is to be 



SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 53 

washed in the house to soak. Sort 
and mend fresh linen returned from 
laundry. 
Tuesday: Wash household linen and mend. 
Wednesday: Sewing and mending. 
Thursday: Ironing. 
Friday: Sewing. 
Saturday: Clean thoroughly and arrange linen 
cupboard. 

In an establishment with but two domestics, a 
cuisiniere and a femme de chambre, much the same 
sequence of operations would take place, with the 
extra cleaning of halls and rooms falling equally 
upon the two, the chambermaid serving also as par- 
lour maid and attending the door. 

With but one servant, the general maid of all 
work, or bonne a tout faire, will of necessity need 
the aiding hand once and again of the mistress of 
the house, or by the supplanting by an occasional ex- 
tra day's labour called in from outside. 



Mornings: Salle a manger, petit dejeuner, salon, 
marketing and making up the sleep- 
ing-rooms aided by the mistress. 

Afternoon : On succeeding days one apartment to be 
thoroughly cleaned. Dejeuner to be 
served at noon. The washing of 
small household linen, mending, iron- 
ing; preparing and serving of dinner 
at seven o'clock and the washing up. 



54 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

All this, assuming that the family meals are of 
the simplest order and that little or no entertaining 
is undertaken, and that the mistress does many of the 
light errands and largely occupies herself with the 
children in case there are any. 

A good general servant can be got in the country 
districts in Germany for as little as fifty dollars a 
year, maybe even less, but she will do wonders on 
that two hundred and fifty marks, dressing neatly in 
heavy homespun and woolens that do not often have 
to be replenished, eating her frugal black bread and 
sausage, provided for her by the house, without a 
grumble, even laying by money in the savings 
bank. 

One of the principal points of disfavour for do- 
mestic service which is manifesting itself in Germany 
is the wretched way in which a servant is often housed, 
frequently sleeping in a dark cupboard, without light 
or air — a mere hole in the wall that cannot be used 
for anything else. 

The German woman labourer is the hardest 
worked of menials; she often does a man's work in 
addition to her own. She it is who cleans the streets 
and removes the garbage. It is nothing strange, 
then, to learn that she is going more and more into 
factory work, which the growing industrial boom 
in Germany is opening up for her. 

Servants are usually abominably housed every- 
where on the Continent. In France they are usually 
jammed up under the mansard with only a pane of 
glass in the ceiling to give air and light. The sub- 



SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 55 

ject has been much agitated of late, but no general 
reform has resulted, nor was one looked for. 

In the French country hotel, the early riser will 
often discover the gargon rolled up in a blanket on 
the floor at the back of the hall, or at best on a 
collapsible cot which he will carry away under his 
arm in the morning. 

Swiss servants are good, reliable and industrious, 
but are apt to be cold, disagreeable and unpleasant to 
get on with. Especially with a stranger they are 
often unsympathetic, not to say hostile, a fact which 
makes their presence in the house not always agree- 
able. The great demand for servants in hotels in 
Switzerland tends to make them independent to a 
shameful degree. In the summer season, between 
the getting in the crops, work in the hotels and 
the embroidery factories, the supply of labour is not 
always up to the demand, hence every one is over- 
worked and unduly hurried and apt to be irritable. 

In marked contrast is the happy-go-lucky Italian 
servant who has some of the exasperating and endear- 
ing qualities which are possessed by the Irish. Smiling 
and of pleasant manner, the Italian woman servant 
will try to please for any old price one is minded to 
give her. For thirty or forty lire she will serve you 
well and cook good meals in native style for a month, 
with never a grumble as to short rations if you clean 
up the platter in the dining-room. 

She calls her mistress madonna, with a caressing 
accent, and buys her a candle that has been blessed 
to burn beside her bed. Her kitchen looks like the 



56 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

wake of a whirlwind, with a baby or two making 
playthings of the vegetables, clucking fowls stalk- 
ing about, and neighbours dropping in for a 
chat. 

On your fete day, or birthday, your French servant 
will remember you with a present of a pot-plant in 
flower, tied up with a ribbon, often accompanied by a 
badly spelled, affectionate little note. In turn you 
are expected to reciprocate in the same manner, and 
if you get up for her a little informal party, with 
cakes and wine, you will incur no lack of dignity or 
strain your proper relations. 

The French cafe garqon is one of the most com- 
petent of public servants. Also he is the most per- 
sonally intimate of waiters. This comes from the 
fact that the clientele of the average cafe is largely 
made up of people who come regularly, thus mutu- 
ally dependent relations come about quite naturally 
between the waiter and the particular coterie which 
he regularly serves. He is polite and attentive, 
chatty and communicative, but never familiar. He 
will bring writing materials if you ask him for du 
quoi ecrire — the cafe letter head, in a folder, accom- 
panied by blotting paper that won't blot, pale ink 
and a scratchy pen. With good taste and judgment 
he will pick out from the pile of illustrated journals 
which the establishment provides for its clients those 
that he thinks are suitable for the eyes of the ladies — 
though not many of them are. He brings out the 
backgammon board and the dominoes, first wiping 
off the table with the folded napkin which always 



SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 57 

hangs across his left arm. He never suggests by a 
covert hovering about that one should order some- 
thing more, but serves the coffee, or whatever may 
have been ordered, and allows one to sit under its 
protection all of the evening if so desired. He un- 
derstands that one comes to a cafe to repose, often 
more for this even than to drink. He will do any- 
thing but bring one a glass of ice water alone. In 
return for his excellent service this embarrassing 
order should never be given him by those with de- 
generate palates. 

When one stops to think of the cosmopolitan treat- 
ment that the servants of European hotels have to 
contend with, the world-varying demands which they 
have to meet, with complaints in a dozen languages 
that they must straighten out — usually caused by 
misunderstanding, brought about by the ignorance 
of foreign manners and customs on the part of those 
whom they are serving, it must certainly be admitted 
that as a class European public servants are good and 
efficient. There may be individual shortcomings, 
but these only prove the strength of the statement. 
Their politeness is not always reciprocated by those 
whom they serve, and this of itself is enough to strain 
good nature to the breaking point. Whatever may 
be the present defects in the system of recruiting, 
and the conduct of servants in European hotels, the 
question may be asked if some of them may not be 
induced, often unwittingly maybe, by their exigent 
patrons. 

The following observations on Continental hotel 



58 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

servants may open a new line of thought with some 
who would otherwise condemn hastily: 

One of the first requirements of the cosmopolitan 
type of European hotel is that its personnel — its 
staff — must have some working knowledge of three 
or four languages. The European waiter educates 
himself by taking service in various countries for the 
purpose of increasing his vocabulary, well knowing 
that nothing will so quickly improve his ability to 
grasp opportunity. 

As for the hall porter, that resplendent guardian 
of the hotel entrance, he is a veritable linguist. In 
the course of a few minutes he must switch from 
one to another of a half a dozen languages, beside 
be an expert in differentiating between American 
lingo and real English. His is no sinecure, and a 
tip is often worthily bestowed on him, for he is a 
buffer between the tourist and her own incompetence. 
No question is too trivial for his consideration, no 
situation so complicated that he cannot grapple with 
it. The strain on his temper and ability can only be 
met by keeping the parting tip always in mental 
view. He is the mainstay of the ladies and is asked 
almost as many questions as the captain of an Atlantic 
liner. He is the local directory, and can give any 
kind of information from where to buy hat pins to 
what the weather will be a day hence — if he does not 
really know he will make a good guess at it. His 
province is to see to the incoming and outgoing of 
the luggage, to sift out an excited and nervous crowd 
of travellers, with only, in most cases, a general 



SERVANTS AND THE SERVANT QUESTION 59 

idea of where they want to go, and what they want 
to do, and clarify their plans for them, getting them 
off to the right trains, or into their own automobiles 
or carriages. Whatever tip he may get he usually 
deserves, whether it be as little as two francs or as 
much as ten. 

The head waiter controls the dining-room and the 
army of waiters. He seemingly has nothing to do 
but to bow politely, but the responsibility is his and 
all kicks should be made to him; also it is he who 
presents the bill on parting, when it is asked for at 
the last meal. The big, fat tips of one's stay goes 
usually to this Chesterfieldian personage principally 
for those pleasant bows and " good-mornings " with 
which he has brightened your stay, though one with 
any conscience will tip her waiter who has served 
as well. 

Out of each million of hotel guests in Paris, count- 
ing those only who frequent the four chief classes of 
hotels, 650,000 are French provincials, the rest be- 
ing etrangers, Americans, most likely, in the largest 
number. 

The valet de chambre, or the femme de chambre 
in a big Paris hotel gains on an average of thirty- 
five francs a month as salary, which with " gratifica- 
tions," a new word which the craft has adopted for 
ponrboire, may bring it up to one hundred, one hun- 
dred and twenty-five or even one hundred and fifty 
francs. 

The sommeliers, or garcons, who serve on the 
upper floors, who dress staidly in black and shuffle 



60 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

about like croque-morts (usually Swiss or Alsaciens, 
or even Germans) touch perhaps a hundred francs 
as salary or two hundred and fifty or more — gratifica- 
tion compris. 

The wages, or perhaps one should say salaries, of 
the kitchen staff of a great modern Paris hotel — leav- 
ing the chef-directeur, the successor of the former 
ecuyer de cuisine, out of the calculation, and who 
may get anything that the management can be made 
to pay — run from three hundred to four hundred 
francs a month — Potagers, sauciers, rotisseurs, entre- 
metiers, patissiers and glaciers. 

Seven brigades of these sub-cellar employees 
(though now it is the fashion to put the kitchens on 
the roof) make soup in marmites as big as bath tubs, 
roast meat on broches as long as assagai spears and 
make a friture of three hundred baby trout in a 
cauldron of boiling oil as big as the basin of a 
Versailles fountain. 

A dependency of all hotel kitchens is the cafeterie. 
Here real artists pour boiling water drop by drop 
on the finest powdered moka, make also the smooth- 
est possible chocolate and infuse the choicest pekoes, 
and the, be it not forgot, returns the greatest pro- 
portionate profit in many a cafe and restaurant in 
Paris where the drinking of it has become a fad if 
not a custom — four sous' worth of tea-leaves return 
the cafe proprietor thirty sous in silver. 




no marketing by telephone in european 

households 
outdoor markets of europe 
markets index to national character 
representative mediterranean market 
toulon's multi-coloured daily market 
cosmopolitan market women 
bargaining under the red umbrellas 
primitive weights and measures 
cheap garden produce 
a corner in snails 
variety the characteristic of the foreign 

MARKET 
BIG STALL OWNERS AND SMALL VENDORS 
BLEND OF FLOWERS AND VEGETABLES 
OFFICERS GO MARKETING 
CHEAP END OF THE MARKET 
FISH MARKET 

GREAT GOOSE MARKET OF GERMANY 
COVENT GARDEN, WHERE LONDON GOES TO MARKET 
THE COSTER AND HIS " MOKE " 
ONE BUYS DEARLY IN LONDON MARKETS 
ICE A LUXURY 

PUSH-CART VENDORS IN PARIS 
11 LES MERCHANDES DES QUATRE SAISONS " 



Ill 

FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 

One does not market by telephone in Europe. The 
telephone is rare enough in business, and has not 
entered into the domestic scheme of things at all. 
The good, frugal housekeepers go to market them- 
selves, making of it one of the serious businesses of 
the day. Besides being an economic question, it is 
to the lady of the house an amusement. Bargaining 
is a passion of the European woman, and nowhere 
does this antiquated method of buying and selling 
exist in so near an approach to its most primitive 
form as in the market place. 

The Frenchwoman goes to market herself, and 
if of the better class, with a bonne carrying the 
market basket in which to bring back the purchases. 
Often the bonne or the cuisiniere is entrusted with this 
duty herself, though for the most part the mistress 
prefers to go; she longs for the excitement of getting 
her bunch of asparagus one sou cheaper, even if it 
takes the best part of the morning. She is the most 
careful of buyers, no skilful arrangement of fruit to 
hide defects escapes her keen eye, no juggling of the 
scales goes on unnoticed. The daily marketing oper- 
ation brings out the Frenchwoman's aptitude for 
small savings. 

63 



64 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

The Italian housekeeper goes marketing with her 
maid for a chaperone, the maid invariably following 
after, carrying her mistress' parasol as well as the 
market basket, it not being etiquette for the Italian 
lady to carry anything. 

The Dutch woman is seen at market sampling 
the round, flat cheeses of her country, with a modern 
hat perched on top of the white cap and antique 
gold ornaments in an endeavour to reconcile con- 
flicting styles. The insistent point is that marketing 
in Europe is a woman's occupation. 

As the economy of Europe consists in saving rather 
than producing, there is no branch of her expendi- 
ture that the thrifty housekeeper watches more closely 
than the daily marketing, and where the servant is 
entrusted with it her mistress is always too well posted 
on values to permit of much juggling with the market 
money. 

If one wants to learn something of the real life of 
a people, go to market with them and study what 
they eat and how they buy it. The open-air markets 
of Europe are out-of-door theatres — moving-picture 
shows — where every phase of life, from social science 
to household economics, can be studied. 

In their general characteristics markets are much 
alike and furnish always one of the most picturesque 
impressions that one retains of life abroad. They 
are usually spread out in the principal square, with 
a centre-piece of a sculptured fountain, or grouped 
about an ancient church in an intimate and confiding 
manner. Thus one bargains for a salad beneath 



FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 65 

sculptured saints and broken-nosed angels, or under 
big umbrellas like gigantic polychrome mushrooms 
in the warmer latitudes. 

The produce is brought in from the country round 
about in the slow, uneconomic way that the European 
peasant usually works, by diminutive donkey-carts, 
or in basket panniers slung across the backs of mules, 
in high, two-wheeled French carts, in quaint, cradle- 
shaped Dutch wagons, or by Sicilian carts decorated 
like a circus wagon ; perhaps even it may be brought 
in a basket on the arm, or down a mountainside 
strapped over the shoulders. 

Every Continental town of any pretensions has a 
weekly market — a veritable county fair, where every 
conceivable article that may tempt a small community 
is on sale. The market is the social gathering place 
as well as a produce exchange. This gives the frugal 
European peasant an opportunity to exchange local 
gossip without neglecting business. There is amuse- 
ment, too. An itinerant little theatre in a gypsy 
wagon runs a little show, and there may be a merry- 
go-round, and there are always foolish knick-knacks 
being offered for sale which have no place in any 
self-respecting trading community. 

As a representative Mediterranean market that of 
Toulon, in southern France, may be taken as a type. 

It has all the characteristics of the markets of all 
semi-tropical European countries, and a good many 
peculiar to itself. 

Toulon is France's biggest war port and naval 
station. From a dozen to twenty-five ships of the 



66 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

fleet are always at anchor in the harbour, and the 
blue-jackets aboard must be fed, as well as a stand- 
ing garrison of thirty thousand or more soldiers, 
in addition to the city's population of a hundred 




TV 

VVO Men ~*~~ 



thousand. Toulon's market under such conditions 
may be taken as a concrete example, and a study of 
it will prove a liberal education for any one interested 
in foodstuffs. 

It is a daily market, and from seven until noon, 
stretches along one of the principal tree-lined boule- 



FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 67 

vards for fully half a mile, a riot of colour, with the 
excited movements of a lively southern people, for 
Toulon can show as parti-coloured a conglomeration 
of inhabitants as any of the cosmopolitan Mediter- 
ranean seaports. 

You and the bonne with a filet on her arm (the 
cord bag or carryall for all kinds of plunder) , start 
out about nine for the day's marketing. These 
southern countries don't stir early, and before nine 
you run the risk that not all of the petty merchants 
will have arranged their wares. 

Temporary stalls of boards are ranged on either 
side under the giant plantain trees, often still further 
protected by great umbrellas and awnings, not of the 
usual white, but red-brown, that the sun and wind 
have bleached to every shade from orange to tan. 
Toulon's market, because of its varied colouring, has 
been the inspiration of many an artist. Heaped up 
in big baskets is as varied and exotic a lot of produce 
as was ever brought together. 

You join the crowd of buyers strolling critically 
along the promenade between the stalls, over which 
women preside almost exclusively. It is the women 
who control the markets of Europe. It is essentially 
a woman's business, and the men appear only as 
auxiliaries, except where a cattle market is an adjunct 
of the ordinary market. The men are the producers 
and leave it to their women to get the money and 
also keep it safely. 

These Toulon market women are as motley as 
their wares. There are Italians, Corsicans, Maltese 



68 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

and the native dark Provengaux. Every Mediter- 
ranean type is here, an unkempt, independent crowd. 
Many of them scarcely speak French enough to sell 
their produce, and they have nine-and-twenty ways 
of counting money, which, combined with a laxity 
in giving the right change, keeps one on the alert. 
They are more noisy and vociferous than their 
phlegmatic sisters of the North, and have honeyed 
tongues when they wish. " Ma belle, ma belle," 
they call out to you coaxingly, and again, " What a 
beautiful hat, Madonna; won't the bella donna look 
at my strawberries, only twelve sous the kilo." Six 
cents a pound isn't dear for March strawberries. 

Though the French say Toulon is the most ex- 
pensive market in France, it seemed cheap enough 
to the American housekeeper. A family of three 
fared sumptuously on an outlay of from three to four 
francs a day. If you paid more than two cents for 
a fine head of escarole you were a bad bargainer; 
ten cents' worth of petits pots took the bonne a good 
part of the morning to shell out, and asparagus sold 
at a sliding scale from eight to twenty cents for a 
bunch of two dozen stalks, according to quantity in 
the market. 

Spaniards, who patriotically paint their barrows in 
the national colours, in red and yellow stripes, handle 
the orange business and the recently introduced 
banana, which is scrubby and tasteless and costs two 
and three sous apiece. 

Spring vegetables were really winter vegetables, 
and came from across the Mediterranean from Al- 



FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 69 

geria so early that there was scarcely any break in 
their continuity from one year's end to another. 
The highly prized and expensive burr artichoke, with 
us what is called " French," is the staple and most 
common vegetable of the Mediterranean countries, 
and at times is almost an encumberer of the markets 
at a sou or two apiece, while the eggplant runs it a 
close second at a similar price. 

Most vegetables are sold by weight. The mer- 
chant under the red umbrella weighs your potatoes 
on a primitive brass scale (which is probably quite 
unreliable) which she balances by hand, and in the 
manipulating becomes so expert that if one adopted 
the tactics of the good English housekeeper and 
weighed the purchases over again at home, the error 
might not always be found in the seller's favour. 
Figs are an exception and are carefully counted out 
by the dozen, big purple ones and the choice grey 
varieties. There is also the Barbary fig, which has 
been brought across from Africa, in other words, the 
prickly pear, a diet which would seem to us as suit- 
able only for a hedgehog, but which in reality is the 
staple food with the Arab and much liked by the 
southern French, and indeed, is not at all bad when 
one learns to like it. 

You discover a fat snail climbing up your gown, 
and find that you have reached the place where snails 
are sold, and that you have captured a stray one from 
a lot which have been turned out to graze on a straw 
mat smeared with some sort of stickiness. There 
are baskets of thousands of them sitting about, as 



70 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

many clinging to the outside as are inside. Moving 
slowly, they do not stray far, but personal contact 
is not agreeable. Snails may seem dear at a franc 
a dozen if one has not the gout for them. These 
are not the common, garden-destroying kind, but a 
special breed that is hunted in thickets at night by 
the light of a lantern, or fattened in a pen of logs 
covered with a wire netting. Luxuries they are, 
however, and are so regarded by the French, and 
some few of the rest of us. 

Near the snails is the vendor of wild herbs, where 
for a few sous you may buy a variety of weeds out 
of which to make one of the fifty or more kinds of 
tizanes, or herb teas. The French love to dose them- 
selves on these brews, one or another of which is 
warranted to ease most of the ills of flesh. There 
are also the sweet-scented mountain plants, wild 
lavender, thyme and the like, good for laying away 
among clothes to keep out insects. 

In the spring you can buy young plants already 
rooted with which to stock your flower or vegetable 
garden, and three-day-old little chicks at a franc 
apiece and goslings at a little more. Thus is saved 
much preliminary work for the amateur farmer and 
bird fancier. 

From the big stall owners you work down the long 
line to where the small vendors sit. These, for the 
most part, have only a meagre little handful of stuff 
grown in a tiny garden shaded by a couple of olive 
trees. One old woman sits knitting with a single 
white hen resting contentedly on her knee, while 



FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 71 

another has only a bunch of wild flowers picked 
by the roadside, another a queerly assorted basket 
whose contents are cherries and a pair of guinea pigs, 
the latter being a great delicacy with the country 
French, and not dear at a franc and a half a pair. 

There are strawberries eight months of the year, 
sometimes tied up in cabbage leaves that they may 
not wilt, or they are the little wild strawberry sold 
in earthen jars covered with a cornucopia of paper, 
more prized than the cultivated variety and selling 
at nearly double the price. 

In the winter come in the olives, green and black, 
and chestnuts, out of which the Italian population 
makes flour. In summer there is a red riot of to- 
matoes at two cents a pound, and melons of many 
shades, none of the latter being particularly cheap 
at a franc. 

The flower stalls are brilliant in this southern 
country. Even among the vegetable dealers a few 
flowers can always be picked up. This mingling of 
flowers and green stuff for the table is the great charm 
of many European markets, particularly those around 
the Mediterranean, where for a few cents a day the 
house can be kept in flowers the year round. 

Here in Toulon's open-air market cheap butchers 
sell to the cheap trade queer cuts of equivocal-looking 
meat, and Italian women make a business of the 
manufacture of ravioli — macaroni stuffed with meat 
and herbs — for the same class of trade. You pass 
this end of the market by. There are booths that 
sell all kinds of drygoods, and a corner is devoted 



7J rilF AMERICAN woman ABROAD 

to miscellaneous rubbish, ranging from odd shoes 
to rusty keys 

l>\ ten 0*dock I dense crowd surges between the 

is, mistresses and their attendant bonnes, maids 

alone, eagerly looking out tor their " commission. " 

each armed with either a basket When the 

lady of the houst tempts - carry her own pur- 

- ilways in i cloth bag. often nicely era- 

dered; tfH > the badge of the servant. This 

>. ::le distinctions to be observed. 

Officers from the warships at anchor in the Roads 




l ■. . ig for their mess, with tu o blue-jackets 

trailing . — iging a big < _ . basket 

\ three-starred - .'.. with much 

be seen selecting 

espe< te lot of eh* es - his 

ig absence < w /ride. 

n. shuttles are the bfigmrt 

sellers, this trad < j being great 

cakes bake* i tj g tic pie dishes is at a 

sou a sfict 

tiers out to the cIm 
iff can pick oufl 
s >: . sea ~nd damaged stuff. By 



FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 73 

noon everything must be cleared away, and now is 
the time for low prices. Things that won't keep 
over to be sold as seconds the next day are cut down 
to almost gift prices. Carts come along in due time 
and gather up the empty baskets, stalls are torn down 
and carried away and the street sweepers appear with 
their brooms, picturesquely clad and kerchiefed 
Italian women. In another hour not a cabbage leaf 
is to be seen. 

Near Toulon's principal market, in the aptly named 
Place de la Poissonnerie, is the fish market, where the 
best of the Mediterranean finny tribe lie in damp 
beds of seaweed, the only method of keeping them 
fresh being to pour water over them. The fish 
dealers sit with their feet on a petit-banc or foot-stool, 
out of reach of the soused pavement, blagueing and 
blackguarding their neighbours, too indolent and 
ignorant of business methods to care if one buys or 
not. 

One of the sights of Germany is the goose market 
at Friedrichfelde, a little village near Berlin. Here 
are gathered geese from all parts of Europe, and 
five million foreign and domestic birds are sold each 
year. The goose is the national bird of the German 
dinner table, and however the German housekeeper 
may scrimp all the week there must always be a gans 
for the Sunday dinner. 

Every day from twenty to thirty thousand squawk- 
ing, hissing geese are brought to this great wholesale 
market, chiefly in slatted crates, by train from all over 
eastern Europe. During the summer, Germany can 



74 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

furnish her own supply, but in the winter, train loads 
are brought from Holland, where, the season being 
milder, the geese are more easily bred. In the late 
summer they come in large numbers from Russia and 
Poland, being driven along the road and their num- 
bers added to as they pass through the villages. At 
the frontier they are loaded on to box cars in four- 
story crates and forwarded by fast freight to the 
central market. For four or five days they travel 
without food or drink, hence it is small wonder that 
a nervous, bad-tempered lot of geese usually await 
the buyers. Each buyer carries a shepherd's crook 
with which he singles out his purchases by the neck. 
The market is controlled by a syndicate, and strict 
measures are taken to insure only a healthy product, 
a corps of inspectors being employed to examine the 
health of the birds, doubtful cases being quarantined 
for six weeks, while those manifestly diseased are 
destroyed at once. 

They are young, these much-travelled geese, aver- 
aging from five to eight months, and are bought in 
the market for eighty cents to a dollar, according 
to weight. After they are fattened for a month or 
two on the best barley and green stuff, they bring 
nearly two dollars and a half and weigh from ten 
to twelve pounds. 

The method of fattening to produce the diseased 
livers which are used to fabricate the pate-de-foie- 
gras rather destroys one's taste for this delicacy. 
The geese are nailed down by their feet so that ex- 
ercise may not interfere with their putting on flesh, 



FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 75 

when, at regular intervals, they are stuffed by a 
machine, their stomachs being nicely massaged at 
the same time. Nothing is left to the vagaries of 
the natural appetite. Strassbourg has the reputation 
of turning out the best grade of pate-de-foie-gras, 
but it is made all over Germany with success, 
and while the fattening process may not always 
be so barbarous, forced feeding is generally re- 
sorted to. 

London goes to market at Covent Garden, the 
one district which is astir early. Six o'clock is late 
and at eight the bargain hunters begin to be seen. 
At ten the garbage is being swept up and picked 
over by street combers, and before noon this heart of 
old London is deserted. 

The actual area of Covent Garden seems small 
to encompass the central food supply of the world's 
biggest city until one notices that it really trickles 
through the ramifications of a maze of neighbouring 
streets. Stalls, push-carts, wagons, costers and their 
donkeys, and barrows with peddlers of all ranks 
link up Holborn and the Strand by a livid stream of 
humanity and its paraphernalia in a most amazing 
fashion. All the stall owners pay a tax for the 
privilege of selling produce in London streets here- 
abouts as a ground rental to the Duke of Bedford, 
London's largest landowner. Covent Garden and 
the surrounding streets are his property, as well as 
the houses which line them, and the enormous ren- 
tals pay a truly royal tribute to the wealthiest of 
Britain's peers. 



76 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

London markets in general are perhaps the dear- 
est in Europe. Continental Europe and North 
Africa are Britain's market gardens, though the Eng- 
lish housekeeper still clings fondly to the belief that 
whatever is grown in her own country is the best, 
the shopkeeper encouraging her in this delusion. 
The catch phrase in the English shop is, " Best 
English, ma'am," though the produce may be aspar- 
agus from Provence, little potatoes from Brittany, 
tomatoes from Algeria or eggs and butter from Den- 
mark and Norway. In spite of all this the English 
housekeeper will readily pay more for produce grown 
at home than for that which comes from across the 
Channel, the North Sea or the Mediterranean. This 
is not because the quality is actually superior, but 
because it is home-grown, though this may be preju- 
dice quite as much as patriotism. 

Covent Garden market has its chief picturesque 
element in its costers and their environment. The 
coster in his velveteens with many rows of " pearlies " 
heaps up his tiny barrow, drawn by his faithful 
" moke," and perambulates green stuff through Lon- 
don's East End, accompanied by his " Harriet," the 
couple forming the typical 'Arry and 'Arriet of the 
comic papers. Like most picturesque survivals, mod- 
ern life is ironing him down to the flat ugliness of 
the average London type, and his be-buttoned cos- 
tume is fast changing into the commonplace garb 
of the British workingman, though his partner still 
flaunts her hat of bedraggled plumes, which is always 
in fashion among her kind. She buys these plumes 







A Mediterranean Market 



FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 77 

through a "feather club" by paying a weekly in- 
stalment. No more unsuitable feminine head adorn- 
ment for one of her class could be conceived than an 
ostrich plume, which, by the very order of things, 
is most unsuitable for the misty, moisty climate of 
the banks of London's river. 

The coster barrow-vendor buys cheap stuff to be- 
gin with, and sells cheaply too, so that his margin 
of profit is slight, but he will go hungry before his 
" moke " will, and he treats the little animal better 
by far than he does his own family when it comes 
to distributing favours amongst them. 

Weights and measures with the English small 
shopkeeper are queer and untrustworthy. Not long 
ago a bitter discussion was carried on through the 
press on the subject, and the defence of the market- 
man was not a denial so much as an excuse that he 
had to make up somewhere for the long credit sys- 
tem that prevails among the clientele of all classes 
of traders. This made for losses which could not 
otherwise be met. 

The cost of living is a factor here which is being 
discussed in its higher reaches. A scarcity of food 
of certain kinds accounts for some of this, an ex- 
travagant attitude towards life for more, and the 
actual conditions of luxury and convenience under 
which the food supply is purveyed in this twentieth 
century for much more. The thing is noticeable in 
England, in Germany, in France and even in Italy. 
There is no monopoly of this state of affairs in 
America ; all classes all over the world are feeling it. 



78 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

but are doing very little that might really combat 
it successfully. 

In England one buys fowls and fish in the same 
shop. Ice is a luxury that can often only be had of 
the fishmonger, and as a favour on the part of that 
usually high-handed individual. Such a small lump 
as one may get for a few cents melts into a mere 
spot of dampness by the time it is delivered and 
seems hardly worth the while. If one buys any- 
thing of an exotic nature in England it costs money. 
To depend upon a purely British home-market bill 
of fare, on the other hand, is monotonous, for the 
supply is exceedingly limited as well as to variety as 
to quantity. 

Successful shopping and marketing in Paris de- 
pends greatly upon a knowledge of local conditions as 
well as a very complete and true estimate of the ways 
of the shopkeeper and greengrocer. Neither the 
shopkeeper nor the market man or woman are wedded 
to fixed prices as yet, at least not all of them, very 
few in fact, so it behooves the stranger to pocket her 
pride and do a little bargaining on the side, and beat 
them down if she can. 

As a phase of woman's work, that of the shop em- 
ployees of Paris, as well as of those who may sell 
on their own account from a push-cart or a market- 
stall, is an interesting study. Its like exists in no 
other land. 

In the lowest merchandising scale are the ven- 
deuses ambulantes, the push-cart sellers, whose stock 
in trade may be fresh vegetables, coal and wood, or 



FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 79 

thread and needles and odds and ends of so-called 
" bankrupt stocks " of drygoods. There are sup- 
posedly six thousand of this class of " shopkeepers " 
in Paris, and they all make known their wares by 
the most strident and unmusical cries. 

Of all this noisy crew the only class which ever 
had any interest for us was the marchande de quatre 
saisons, or fresh vegetable dealers, of whom we oc- 
casionally bought supplies instead of going to the 
greengrocer's on the corner. " Pots Verts, Pots 
Verts," or " J'ai de la cerise, de la belle cerise — Cerise 
douce," or " La Valence, la belle Valence," meaning 
green peas, cherries or oranges. These are the 
sounds one hears in the quartiers of Paris, but they 
are by no means the only harmonious notes to be 
picked out of the chorus. 

All these hard-working women, for their risks are 
great and their profits small, are possessed of a per- 
mit from the Prefet of Police and wear in a con- 
spicuous place, frequently attached to their belts, an 
enormous numbered plaque as a sort of guarantee of 
identification if not of responsibility. One woman 
of this class will often make her rounds throughout 
the year, varying her agricultural merchandise accord- 
ing to the four seasons, hence their familiar name. 

These ambulant orange, fish, vegetable or flower 
sellers make their provision at the great central 
markets, Les Halles, around four in the morning, 
buying from a commission dealer a certain quantity 
per day, or often combining among themselves and 
taking a truck load at specially favourable prices, 



8o 



THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 



assuming of course an additional risk if the quantity 
be large or their numbers few. 

Their stocks are displayed with a barbaric sort 
of taste, and with their heavy load they are soon 
ready to start out on their rounds, in many cases after 
having pushed their carts four or five miles across 
town, each to her own particular quarter. 

At noon these wandering women are supposed, in 
accordance with the law, to retire from the public 
thoroughfares, and it is at this moment, or there- 




abouts, that one is able to buy at the lowest prices, 
if indeed one is willing to run the risk of still being 
able to find a fresh and varied assortment, which of 
course sometimes happens, though, on the other hand, 
a stock of fish or lettuces and other aliments of a 
like nature that has been trundled through dusty 
streets for six or eight hours can hardly be of the 
highest sanitary value as food. 

A woman from thirty to thirty-five years of age, 
at this hard labour, may gain as much as two and a 
half francs a day if she meets with no engulfing losses 



FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 81 

caused by unsold stocks. Their little carts, charettes, 
are, for the most part, hired by the day at twelve 
or fifteen sous. 

Another class of vendeuses, more miserable still, 
and whose merchandise, so far as edibles go, is often 
in a still more dubious condition, but frequently a 
little cheaper in price, is that which sells from a great 
basket carried on the arm and hip, or perhaps on the 
head. They gain perhaps a franc a day net at the 
occupation, and with such modest ambitions are natu- 
rally not of a class noted for their probity in com- 
mercial transactions. 

The marchands de platsirs are a Paris institution 
and may be men, women or boys. They are the 
sellers of children's toys, balloons, mechanical toys 
of little worth and low prices and all that sort of 
thing. They are found in their greatest numbers on 
the Champs Elysees, in the Gardens of the Tuileries 
and in the Luxembourg Gardens on the Rive Gauche. 

Of the itinerant restaurants, the Restaurants des 
Pieds Humides, the Parisian precursors of the Owl- 
Lunch Wagons, there is nothing to be recounted in 
the way of personal experience except that of obser- 
vation to the purport that their owners seem to be 
in quite the lowest social scale of tradespeople in the 
food of man in all Paris, whether cooked or un- 
cooked. 

The coffee sellers of course pursue a less harmful 
course, but even they are falsifiers in that they do 
not sell coffee per se, at least not pure coffee. They 
claim that the midnight taste is not for pure coffee 



82 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

(at two sous a mug it should be noted), and probably 
it isn't. There is even something besides chicory in 
it according to the " pure food " investigators. 

One species of small shopkeeper, as much an in- 
digenous Paris product as the " cocher," is the news- 
dealer. Sometimes she is a shopkeeper, in a very 
small way, when she is privileged to sell what she 
likes within certain bounds, but if she occupies one 
of those quaintly picturesque " kiosques " which are 
found chiefly along the boulevards, from Neuilly to 
Vincennes and from the Lion de Belfort to the 
Montmartre, she must confine her sales to magazines 
and newspapers and may not include even the pop- 
ular picture post-card. 

The cheese merchants, the milk dealers and the 
pastry cooks are all of the small shopkeeping hier- 
archy which is such an interesting phase of foreign 
life to the stranger. 

In France, these professions are, for various 
reasons, as interesting as anywhere, the more so that 
they deal with certain minor phases of life which in 
a more commercial world are handled on a much 
larger scale. This is the more apparent when one 
considers how very cut up these small industries are. 
You go to a triperie to buy tripe, but you go to a 
charcuterie to buy sausage, and not always do you 
find butter, eggs and milk in the same shop. The 
keeping of the small grocery and a little mercerie, 
where are to be found the odds and ends of the 
sewing basket, form two other feminine occupations. 
Their proprietors struggle with the competition of 



FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 83 

the great universal food and drygoods providers 
until one wonders that their profits can be sufficient 
to pay the rent, let alone a living. Because they exist 
one patronises them occasionally, in the same familiar 
way that one goes to the general store of a New 
England village for a piece of soap, some salt or a 
paper of pins, for these items at least seem to be 
out of the competitive class. 

Nothing can be more charmingly interesting than 
the markets of some of the old Swiss towns, where 
the main street is the usual market place. Market- 
ing in Geneva is a real feat of daring, accomplished 
in the intervals between dodging the motor cars of 
tourists and a double line of street-cars with which 
it shares one of the principal thoroughfares. 

Rumour says that Geneva is going to abolish its 
picturesque street markets; the picturesque seems 
never to be practical, and the old city of Calvin is 
so slicking up that it is beginning to look as unin- 
teresting as the capital city of a new-made state. 
When it comes to a choice between the white-capped 
market women and their quaint baskets and a trolley 
car, the wishes of the stranger might be consulted 
by the authorities who are supposed to care for the 
prosperity of their constituencies. 

Could any one forget the market at Berne? The 
spouting waters from the grotesque mediaeval foun- 
tains splash over the green stuff which has been 
painfully drawn from nearby farms in small carts, 
man and wife pulling side by side with the faith- 
ful dog. Transportation, when it comes to the 



84 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

food of the table, is a mixed problem everywhere. 
At a certain Breton market one has seen women tak- 
ing sheep to market singly in a wheelbarrow, head 
and legs tied down. The Swiss cheeses come down 
from the lofty mountain chalets, born aloft, singly, 
too, on the shoulders of a sturdy mountaineer, held 
on a sort of a small, short-legged table, the latter 
resting on the man's shoulders, the table being placed 
over his head with the cheese on top. 

In general, marketing is dear in Switzerland, the 
cost of food having gone up in some parts as much 
as fifty per cent in recent years. This has undoubt- 
edly been caused here by the great expansion of the 
tourist traffic which now brings strangers to Switzer- 
land the year round — in winter for the snow sports — 
in numbers as large as when they formerly came in 
summer only. 

If one is wintering at Nice on the Riviera, market- 
ing may be said to be one of the supreme attractions 
as one strolls along under the long rows of white 
umbrellas which line certain of the back streets not 
far from the more exclusive and elegant Place Mas- 
sena and the Promenade des Anglais. 

Nice is the winter flower market of all Europe. 
You may buy a basket of carnations and violets for 
a few francs which would cost as many dollars on 
Broadway or Wabash Avenue. An institution of 
the markets of Nice is the band of little porteuses, 
one of whom will carry home for you, in a flat basket 
balanced nicely on her head, all that you may pur- 
chase in an hour's round. The cost is but a few 



FOREIGN MARKETS AND MARKETING 85 

sous, and she will follow your footsteps the whole 
morning and then get home before you do with her 
burden. Each basket bears a numbered plaque, for 
she is a licensed porter, and a small tax is paid to 
the municipal authorities for the privilege of plying 
her trade. 

The flower and vegetable and fish markets of 
Marseilles are a revelation to one who has known 
only the conventional market stall. Seemingly miles 
of this assorted food line many of the streets near 
the very centre of the city, and down along the 
famous Vieux Port, where the fish and shellfish are 
spread out for view, there is an unrealness about it 
all that is as if one saw it in a dream, particularly 
at night, when all is aglow with flaming torches like 
a page preserved out of mediaevalism. 

In Italy, Spain, Algeria and Tunisia there is a 
wealth of colour in the markets, and the throng which 
goes to give the life and movement of a sixteenth- 
century civilisation living in the land of to-day. The 
keynote of it all is kaleidoscopic. They are sur- 
rounded by an individuality and freedom of man- 
ners unknown in our own land where even the pur- 
chase of a box of berries, a pound of butter or the 
provender of the winter's supply for a whole house- 
hold is accomplished as the result of a mere hello 
call over the telephone. 

The element of picturesqueness certainly lends a 
charm from the aesthetic viewpoint, and the procedure 
is indeed interesting. That marketing in the Euro- 
pean fashion is a more satisfactory method than our 



86 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

own, or less so, is all a matter of individual opinion 
and the conditions under which one may momentarily 
be living. At all events it lends variety and a pleas- 
urable occupation to one's life abroad, and that is 
one of the chief reasons why one leaves home and 
settles in a foreign land in the first instance. 



|Some HousekeepirMj Experiences 



11 






tnf 



•<( — * 



FC3T COTTAGE in 

? -— KENT. » 




| £7 COUNTRY HOUSE 
/» NORMANDY 



! & VILLA on the 
i MEDITERRANEAN* 



o*3=> 



INCENTIVE FOR HOME LIFE ABROAD 

THE ALLURING ENGLISH COUNTRYSIDE 

RENTING IN ENGLAND 

OUR COTTAGE IN KENT 

MOVING IN 

SERVANT QUESTION 

FOOD SUPPLY 

SOCIAL AMENITIES 

HOUSEHUNTING IN FRANCE 

OUR NORMAN COUNTRY HOUSE 

FURNISHING 

A " BONNE A TOUT FAIRE " 

MARKETS AND MARKETING 

" BLANCHISSEUSE VS. LAVEUSE " 

NORMAN CIDER 

HOW WE LOST OUR HOUSE 

WHERE FASHIONABLE EUROPE WINTERS 

A LAND OF VILLAS 

HOUSE HUNTING BY AUTOMOBILE 

VILLA " BEAU SOLEIL " 

LIFE BY THE BLUE MEDITERRANEAN 

HOUSEKEEPING ON THE RIVIERA 

" BOUILLABAISSE, GARLIC AND OLIVES " 

WHAT THE MAN THOUGHT ABOUT IT 

HOW THE WOMAN SUMMED IT UP 

THE CHARM OF HOUSEKEEPING ABROAD 



IV 

SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 

In the majority of cases housekeeping abroad for 
the American woman is merely an episode, brought 
about by a spirit of adventure or the desire for nov- 
elty, or, more often perhaps, that longing for a 
hearthstone latent in the most inveterate feminine 
globe-trotter, even though it be a temporary one, rep- 
resented by a British grate, a German porcelain stove, 
an Italian copper brasier of charcoal, or the Pro- 
vencal's apology for its cheerful glow — the smoulder- 
ing root of an olive tree. 

The woman in the case may be a mother whose 
daughters are " studying " something or other, and 
she feels it her duty to provide a home atmosphere 
for the "girls"; again she may belong to that in- 
creasing class of American wanderers who have con- 
tracted the " European habit," and, becoming sur- 
feited with sights and shopping, turns to the making 
of a home as a welcome relief. It may be that the 
cost of living at home has induced her to move the 
family across the ocean in the hopes of finding that 
cheap living abroad of which she has heard such glow- 
ing accounts. That phase of the question, however, is 
dealt with in another chapter. 

Whatever may be the incentive, it not infrequently 

8 9 



go THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

happens that when the woman traveller lingers in a 
foreign land for a longer period than the conven- 
tional few months of feverish touring, her domestic 
instincts begin to assert themselves, spurred on by a 
natural curiosity to get behind the scenes and study 
the workings of a domestic machinery so different 
from that at home, its oftimes archaic features being 
only an added fascination, which, it must be confessed, 
is apt to fade away when given the personal test. 

By this time she has become wearied of the banal 
pension or the conventional hotel, and finds herself 
wondering whether domestic architecture may not be 
as interesting as cathedrals, and markets as fascinat- 
ing as " old masters " if studied with the same amount 
of fervour — so some day she goes house-hunting. 

But more often the courage of the intending house- 
keeper fails; she fears to open what may be a Pan- 
dora's box of unknown troubles, and in consequence 
her villa by the blue Mediterranean, or country house 
among the leafy lanes of old England, remains one 
of those aerial buildings that even the aeroplane can- 
not reach. 

However, if the woman touring abroad has time 
for the domestic experiment, and enters upon it with 
an open mind, regarding it either as a lark or an 
educational experience, according to temperament, she 
should, by all means, try it. Thus she will get a peep 
behind the stage-setting arranged for the tourist, and 
an insight into things not starred by Baedeker, but 
no less entertaining and instructive. It is amazing 
the difference in the viewpoint between the home and 



SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 91 

the hotel, and it should not be missed if one really 
wants to know a country intimately. 




The first of these three minor housekeeping ex- 
periments was made in England. Nowhere does 
country life make so strong an appeal as it does in 
the mellow, finished English countryside. At once 
imagination flashes up pictures of Elizabethan manor 
houses, Queen Anne mansions, old timbered cottages, 
velvet lawns and the ideal garden; while, to the 
American housekeeper, who recalls her struggles in 
the sign language with the newly arrived Hungarian 
girl, it opens up a vision of trained servants to whom 
the service is a profession and not mere incident in 
their careers. On the other hand, it must not be 
overlooked in the yearning for a taste of home life 
in the little British island, that a superior service 
does not always bridge over a lack of conveniences, 
nor do picturesque surroundings altogether compen- 
sate for comforts which have become necessities in 
the American household and are more than likely to 
be wanting in the English house, either great or small. 

The romantic manor-house is not likely to be 
heated, and the American tenant, accustomed to being 
parboiled between steam radiators, finds that the chills 
of centuries in its stone walls are but illy dispelled by 



92 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

the deceptively comfortable looking open fire. As 
to the plumbing, it may be thrilling to recall that it 
is the same that was installed in the time of a Tudor 
King, but scarcely hygienic to have under one's roof. 
Again, more often than not, is the rose-bowered cot- 
tage without running water, and the bathroom non- 
existent (the English practice of "tubbing" by no 
means implies the existence of a bathroom). But 
if the American woman is in search of a new sensation 
and is philosophical enough to make the best of exist- 
ing conditions, the way is made easy for her to sam- 
ple, if she will, home life under English conditions. 

There is no country where " renting " is reduced 
to such a science as in conservative England. The 
Englishman's house may be his castle, but he is seem- 
ingly willing enough to hand over its keys for a con- 
sideration, while the Englishwoman, without a 
qualm, will put her most intimate household treasures 
into the keeping of stranger hands with a confidence 
and absence of sentiment difficult for the American 
householder to understand — a part of the secret prob- 
ably being that rented property is here treated with a 
far greater respect than might be supposed. 

The result is that it is a comparatively easy matter, 
if one will but take the trouble to look about, to find 
almost any style of house that may be wanted and for 
almost any price, in any one of the counties, unfur- 
nished, furnished or really furnished, as may be de- 
sired, even to household linen and family plate. In 
some cases it is possible to take on the family serv- 
ants, an arrangement that would seem ideal. 



SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 93 

One has only to make a study of the " advertise- 
ment pages " of the high class English daily or 
weekly journals to find a most alluring list from which 
to make a choice, from the " gentleman's mansion, 
with a banqueting hall and stabling for twenty," to a 
moated grange with a " ghost that walks," or a 
thatched roof cottage with a genuine old ingle-nook; 
where there may be " an opportunity for hunting with 
three packs." 

Arrangements are usually made through some well- 
known London firm of " estate agents," though some- 
times one deals directly with the owner; occasionally 
the renting will be in the hands of a local agent. 
Then again, in rambling about the country, one may 
stumble upon just what is wanted, as we did, which, 
after all, is the best way. Why not a " House Hunt- 
ing Tour of England " as a varient from the time- 
honoured " Cathedral Tour "? 

England being a land of formalities there is a cer- 
tain amount of red tape to be untangled, especially 
in the case of renting a furnished house where inven- 
tories must be made, etc., etc. The tenant for his 
protection usually has an inventory made out at his 
own expense. 

When in doubt it is well to follow the custom of 
the country and call in the services of a " solicitor " 
— In our tongue, a lawyer. The English, even in the 
slightest business transaction, rush to their " solici- 
tor " as chickens scurry to shelter under the mother 
hen's wing. For the stranger, in almost any business 
transaction except the simplest, a " solicitor " is al- 



94 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

most a necessity and will save trouble. He will some 
day send a bill covering half a dozen sheets of legal 
foolscap, carefully itemised in clerkly long-hand, to 
the effect that a certain style of letter written in your 
behalf cost three shillings, sixpence, another " seven 
and six," etc., etc. But don't be alarmed. The bill 
will probably not total up more than a few dollars 
at most. Minor law is cheap in England; the rather 
disconcerting results of such a system are that should 
a dispute arise with the cook or the washerwoman 
you will in all probability find yourself " referred to 
her solicitor " before you are aware that the matter 
has become in the least serious. 

When the fogs of several London winters drove 
us into the country for a season, it was in Kent, the 
garden county of England, among its hop-fields and 
their picturesque " oast-houses " that we found 
" Rosemary Cottage," typically English, with latticed 
windows, an artistic thatched roof, bowered in jas- 
mine and roses. A rent board leaned over the neatly 
clipped hedge, giving directions to apply to the 
steward of the nearby great estate of which " Rose- 
mary " was a tiny faction. 

We did so by letter, and found that " Rosemary," 
with all its picturesqueness, six rooms and a semi- 
detached kitchen — unfurnished — could be ours for 
twenty pounds (a paltry hundred dollars) a year. 
At first blush it seemed as though it were being given 
to us. We lost no time in signing a year's lease, giv- 
ing as references a London bank, and paid the first 
quarter's rent — five pounds — (rents being paid quar- 



SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 95 

terly instead of monthly), and prepared to move in. 

We took the advice of seasoned movers and had 
our furniture brought down from London, thirty-five 
miles away, in a " pantechnicon " by road. A pan- 
technicon bears some resemblance to a caricature 
freight train that has lost its way. It consists of one 
or more covered vans drawn by a road engine of 
the " stone crusher " type, which chugs painfully 
along the highroads at what seems to be the rate 
of about one-and-a-quarter miles an hour. The pan- 
technicon is slow and sure, like many things English, 
and is the popular method, because cheap, of trans- 
porting household effects about the country. It 
seemed to answer the purpose, and in less time than 
might have been expected our household was duly 
installed. 

Water was " laid on," as is the term, to the extent 
of there being a faucet installed over the kitchen sink. 
This was the private enterprise of our landlord, who 
had it piped at his own expense from a local source 
to the houses on his estate, and in this respect we were 
better off than we should have been in many rural 
neighbourhoods. For light there were candles, and 
but for our "Rochester" burner (which we had 
carried around with us on all our wanderings) to 
lighten the darkness, we would have fared badly. 
The European lamp is but a poor substitute, being 
more top heavy and monumental than luminous. 

It would seem as though one servant ought to 
have sufficed for such a modest establishment; not 
so in England, where sub-division of housework has 



96 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

been reduced to a fine art. Any overlapping of duties 
is rigidly tabooed, and the " general servant " is still 
in the experimental stage. Three were necessary 
and readily found in the tiny hamlet a quarter of a 
mile away, though our English friends had warned 
us that it might be difficult to get servants in the 
country now. The servant bogey is apparently be- 
ginning to threaten the English housekeeper. A 
woman came in to cook, a young girl as housemaid 
("Rosemary's" limited quarters would not admit 
of their "living in"); and while the cook would 
whiten the doorsteps, it required a man (a gardener) 
to sweep off the few feet of brick walk to the front 
gate. Because that came within the gardener's prov- 
ince ! Notwithstanding that, the wages of all three 
did not equal that demanded by " the girl " at home. 

It was not long before we found ourselves in the 
grip of the great problem of housekeeping — the ques- 
tion of food supply. Our sole dependence for gro- 
ceries and household requisites was the one tiny 
" general store," where there was little to be had be- 
yond candles and Colman's mustard. Its proprietor 
(who was also the postmaster) had formed a trust 
of one, and cornered the business of the neighbour- 
hood; consequently, with no competition, you had to 
take, on an emergency, what he had or go without. 

The only other alternative was a three-mile walk 
to a village, a shade larger than ours, where the sup- 
plies were sufficiently varied to include marmalade 
and pickled walnuts. As the inelastic code of Eng- 
lish service could not be revised to meet these condi- 



SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 97 

tions we ran our own errands; that the walk lay 
through our landlord's beautiful home park mitigated 
somewhat against the inconvenience. 

This was before the useful automobile had become 
— as it did later — our best ally, both in house-hunting 
and housekeeping. With it we could have foraged 
to better advantage, and saved, as well, a livery bill 
which also went to swell the till of the village " trust." 

Having discovered " Rosemary " in the course of a 
walking tour, we did not realise that the railway sta- 
tion was four miles away, and while three shillings 
for the " brougham " and two shillings for a " trap " 
there and back could not be called dear in the course 
of the year it helped to do away with the feeling 
that our cottage in the country was costing us " noth- 
ing to speak of." 

All our coal had to be hauled four miles, and no 
matter whether it was " kitchen," " best kitchen " or 
" drawing-room," the quality threw out almost the 
same trivial amount of heat, and the bill was nearly 
double what it would have been in America, had we 
been obliged to heat a house with half a dozen un- 
economic open fires. 

There was no " greengrocer's " in this little com- 
munity of about four hundred souls, so we had to fall 
back on the favour of our retinue of servants to 
skirmish about for the daily supply of vegetables and 
fruit; the result being that their various relatives, as 
a great favour, would be persuaded into selling us, at 
city prices and something more, cabbages, turnips and 
potatoes, and an occasional cauliflower, the beginning 



98 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

and end of the usual list of English vegetables, though 
sometimes this was supplemented by a tough lettuce. 
Even these sources of supply were capricious and 
would fail at inopportune times. 

English fruits at the best are negligible as to qual- 
ity and quantity, and expensive, save the strawberry, 
though there always seemed to be a bountiful supply 
of the plebian, furry gooseberry, judging by the fre- 
quency with which our cook served us that abomina- 
ble dessert — stewed gooseberries and custard. Kent 
is considered the home of the best English strawberry, 
but they were never " at home " for us ; when we did 
capture a box, it was at Covent Garden Market 
prices; as for apples, they were weighed out to us 
by the ounce as grudgingly as if they were precious 
stones. 

An itinerant butcher brought around daily the 
" joints " and chops, but anything more, such as a 
special steak or a fowl, had to be ordered in advance, 
and then was not always forthcoming; it was more 
often than not a see-saw between leg of mutton and 
mutton chops. 

There was but one variety of bread — the " cottage- 
loaf " — heavy and stodgy, the product of a bake- 
oven that had come down from the time of the 
Georges, an adjunct of the baker's own cottage. 

As an example of the futility of trying to modify 
tradition, we pleaded with the baker to make us 
something that at least looked like a roll. He 
promised, to do him justice, reluctantly, and next 
day we received a litter of six miniature " cottage- 



SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 99 

loaves," perfect replicas of the large one. As well 
try to alter the mould of his mind as change the shape 
of that loaf, which must have been designed by 
King Alfred when he turned cook! 

Eggs in time became a luxury, and in winter could 
not be had at any price. The only recourse was to 




A U1TTELR 
OF 

COTTACrL 
LOAVE.5 



include them on our shopping list and bring them 
out from London. 

We finally rebelled at a diet made up largely of 
boiled mutton, boiled potatoes and soggy puddings, 
and in desperation had all of our supplies sent from 
London, three hours away by rail; again a profit on 
the village " monopoly " for bringing them from 
the station. These included a stock of American 
canned goods at prices double what they cost at home. 

In truth, our living in our English country cottage 
proved even more expensive than in our London city 
apartment. 

The charm of the English countryside is very 



ioo THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

real, but its resources are apt to be meagre and 
unsatisfactory. It is well for the prospective house- 
holder to inquire into the practical housekeeping 
possibilities of the neighbourhood wherein is situated 
the picturesque cottage or Tudor mansion before 
closing the bargain. To be forty miles from a fresh 
egg is rather a damper on the enthusiasm inspired 
by the proximity of the ivy-clad ruin whose history 
is written in Domesday Book. 

We might have thought that some of our troubles 
resulted from an ignorance of the local situation, 
except for the fact that English housekeepers in all 
rural communities may be heard bewailing the same 
conditions. 

There is a live movement now on foot in England 
towards imitating the intensive gardening of the 
French. If it is successful it will do much towards 
lightening one phase of the burden of housekeeping. 

In setting up an establishment in a small English 
community the stranger comes in contact with tradi- 
tions and customs that seem puerile and even amus- 
ing to an outsider, but are often none the less ex- 
asperating; all the same it is well to respect them. 
Nothing is so out of place as originality under these 
circumstances, though the " outlander," especially the 
American, who runs counter to local prejudices, will 
be judged leniently, where one of their own country- 
men would not be. The cult of the American is a 
popular one everywhere across the water these days. 

Even as casual tenants we found that we could 
not escape certain ready-made duties. There was a 



SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 101 



waiting list of recipients for our bounty; the lady 
of the house was expected to do her share of " dis- 
trict visiting " and distributing tracts, and might be 
called upon to pour tea at Sunday-school " treats." 
There is more or less of a code of etiquette gov- 
erning the initiation of a newcomer into local society, 
which, if freely translated, might read this wise: 







Muddy t,»f> 

-B.»\.-JJ, 



If the house is rented furnished, it implies that its 
occupants are birds of passage, and that therefore 
their stay will not be long enough to justify letting 
down the social barriers, though if one attends the 
parish church the vicar will call, and probably the 
vicar's wife — in which case there will be an invitation 
to tea at the vicarage. On the other hand, to take 
a house and furnish it carries with it a certain sug- 
gestion of stability and permanence that makes the 
newcomer worth while, in which case the squire's 



102 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

family will likely call, followed by other local " some- 
bodies," and there will be invitations to afternoon 
teas and garden parties. This delicately graded 
scale is naturally modified by local conditions, but 
here again the American scores, especially the Amer- 
ican woman, if she is a sportswoman and can talk 
" horse and dog," is not averse to long walks, and 
content with gossiping " teas " as her principal diver- 
sion. But as a class the American women are not 
sporty. Riding to hounds does not appeal to their 
tastes, nor does " puppy walking " along muddy 
lanes hold any charms for one addicted to silken 
hose and pumps. And so, in spite of well-meant 
efforts of the community, the American woman is apt 
to feel isolated, and become bored by the, it must 
be acknowledged, rather dull and spiritless existence 
of rural England. 

Undoubtedly this largely accounts for the fact 
that the sociable and vivacious American woman is 
more often to be found making a home in the gayer 
and less formal atmosphere of Continental Europe, 
rather than in that of the alluring English country- 
side, in spite of its traditions of the best home life. 

To confess the truth, we " funked " it, as our 
English friends would say, and as a tenant was 
forthcoming to take the lease off our hands, basely 
deserted " Rosemary " before the year was out. 

Since then we have taken our enjoyment of the 
pleasures of English country life from the equally 
picturesque and far more convenient English country 
inn. 



SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 103 



5^1 COUNTRY HOUSE 
in 
NORMAN 



We were beguiled into another trial of house- 
keeping in a foreign land by one of those " beauty 
spots " so common in the lovely windings of the 
Seine Valley. It was in a little Norman village that 
could boast of every picturesque attribute that a vil- 
lage should have which dated from William the 
Conqueror, old timbered houses that leaned crazily 
over the one straggling street, an ancient Gothic 
church, the whole overtopped by the ruins of a feudal 
castle. The stage setting was perfect, while for the 
housekeeper it had the practical advantage of being 
the appendage of a large, flourishing market town, 
with good shops only a mile away, the two being 
known as ha Grande Ville and La Petite Ville. 

For two years or more this particular corner of 
Normandy had been familiar ground. We had 
come and gone, making the rambling old riverside 
hotel our headquarters for months at a time. Thus 
it was that when we decided to look for a -pled de 
terre of our own, it was to our old friend, its patron, 
that we went for advice, and, in the course of much 
local gossip, finally weeded out the information that 
there were two houses that might be rented. 

The first in local importance was a modern French 
chalet — the kind known as a " Villa coquette," ?l 
hideous type of country house adored by the average 



io 4 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

Frenchman who is disfiguring the loveliness of 
his country with these fantastic specimens of domes- 
tic architecture; an aberration from the national 
artistic taste that cannot be explained except by the 
strong streak of artificiality in the French character. 

This one was of the reddest of brick, with zig-zag 
trimmings of yellow stone, carefully separated by 
chocolate coloured lines. The slate roof, all pin- 
nacles and peaks, was crowned with a fence-like 
arrangement of spiked iron ornaments that made one 
shiver to look at. There were pink and green 
porcelain plaques let in about the windows, while a 
realistic terra cotta cat, with arched back and a 
" cheshire-grin," decorated the ridge pole. 

The rectangular garden was garnished with a sum- 
mer house and a couple of benches of imitation rustic 
work. In spite of ten rooms and a glass-enclosed 
verandah, where one could dine and overlook one 
of the finest views in Normandy, the colour scheme 
of house and cat seemed dear to live with at a rental 
of three hundred dollars per annum. 

A real bargain was a maison bourgeoise, a good 
example of the ample solid mansion of the well-to-do 
provincial French family, big enough to have ab- 
sorbed several of the average modern city flats. 
The ground floor was taken up with the practical 
working part of the establishment. On entering the 
massive front door, flush with the street, the first 
thing that met the eye, and the most prominent, in 
good French style, was the spacious kitchen with its 
rows of shining coppers, to which was subordinated 



SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 105 

the dining-room. Then came the usual number of 
small rooms and passages that clutter up the large 
French house without seeming to be put to any spe- 
cial use, but which, taken together, give really a 
vast area to be put to domestic uses. 

The house was furnished in the formal and meagre 
French taste, in a way that would be totally inade- 
quate to the needs of the American or English house- 
keeper — principally with ornate mantel ornaments 
and gilt tables and long mirrors, but with never an 
easy chair in the whole house. 

While there were electric lights (scarcely any 
town in France is too unimportant to be without 
them) , and the parquet of the salon had come from a 
real historic chateau, the sanitary arrangements were 
practically nil; and while to each bedroom was at- 
tached an elegant and commodious cabinet de toil- 
ette, the stationary washstand (why this deception 
no one could fathom) was pure make-believe and had 
to be filled with water brought in a cruche from the 
pump in the garden. 

We could have gotten all this, with a garden and 
an espalier thrown in, for less than the price of the 
gaudy " villa coquette," about two hundred and fifty 
dollars per annum with taxes, the tenant, not the 
landlord, paying the taxes. But a family of two 
could do with smaller quarters. Besides, this was a 
type of house that could have been duplicated in any 
French neighbourhood, and we were looking for 
" local colour," otherwise why go house-hunting in 
the most picturesque of old French provinces? 



106 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

The right combination was finally found just 
where the village street trailed off into a grassy path 
by the river. It was a cross between a small country 
house and an old sixteenth-century Norman farm- 
house, of weather-beaten grey stone, with a mellow 
red tile roof of many ups and downs, with black 
timbers showing in the high gables and under the 
overhanging eaves. It stood among lush, green 
meadows, in an orchard of apple trees — the small 
cider apple tree of Normandy. There were some 
flower beds and a grape vine hung over the door — 
the whole enclosed by a high, stone wall, capped with 
crumbling tiles. 

The owner was an anjocat in La Grande Ville who 
made this his summer home when he went en vil- 
legiature during the fishing season. We had more 
than once stopped in times past to peer admiringly 
through the tall iron gate, and had always envied 
Monsieur I'avocat as he sat placidly fishing, his 
portly person perched on a chair in one end of a 
clumsy boat, with madame, his wife, at the other 
end, sewing industriously. This year, for some 
reason, monsieur had decided to forego his fishing — 
a sport dear to the Frenchman — and it was this 
which made our opportunity. 

We interviewed monsieur at his etude in his town 
house, and offered to rent the place if the terms were 
agreeable; they were, and the matter was quickly 
arranged. A lease was signed for a year, with an 
option of renewing it for three. The rent, plus the 
taxes, came to something over one hundred dollars 



SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 107 

a year, payable quarterly. The house was even 
partly furnished, though not in a manner of sufficient 
importance to call for a formal inventory, which in 
France, as in England, is taken with a painful atten- 
tion to minutae in leasing a furnished house. 

In the house proper were five rooms — a fair-sized 
salon, an enormous kitchen with a spacious hooded 
chimney, and a small dining-room, an arrangement 
which gives a good illustration of the relative im- 
portance of rooms in the French domestic scheme. 
Above were two bedrooms, each with its tiny cabinet 
de toilette, the usual adjunct of the sleeping-room in 
France, no matter how restricted may be the quar- 
ters in which are hidden away the microscopic bath- 
ing arrangements. 

An outside flight of stone stairs led up to three 
large rooms, and that looked as if they had been 
slapped on as an afterthought. These were promptly 
fitted up as a studio and workroom, and proved an 
ideal arrangement in avoiding conflict between the 
artistic and literary and the domestic factions of the 
household. Monsieur had not installed electric 
lights, so we burned candles in tall, brass candlesticks 
and an American lamp, while water came from the 
pump beside the kitchen door. 

Great beams crossed the low ceilings, and a high 
mantelpiece — a good example of sixteenth-century 
Norman carved woodwork — nearly filled up one side 
of the little salon, and in the fireplace of which stood a 
pair of " basket " andirons, wrought in a fashion that 
would have tempted a collector to carry them away. 



io8 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 



The furniture was sparse, but enough to build on. 
We got some furnishings from our Paris studio, 
picked up some things at local auction sales; un- 
earthed an ancient armoire and some good " lustre " 
ware, and odds and ends of old china in the village 
itself; while for a few francs the kitchen was stocked 
with a generous supply of the earthen casseroles and 
marmites that play such an important role in the 

French kitchen. Thus the 
problem of furnishing was 
solved by degrees, and in 
the process we got not a 
little fun, as well as some 
mild excitement, in bar- 
gaining. 

Our establishment ran 
smoothly with a bonne a 
tout faire — a maid-of-all- 
work — who, for the not ex- 
travagant sum of thirty 
francs (six dollars) and 
keep, did all the work, from 
polishing the waxed floors 
to cooking simple, but ex- 
cellent, meals. The French 
bonne rather prefers to be 
in undisputed possession of the domestic field, and 
while she does her work by rule of thumb she can 
get through with a tremendous lot in the course of the 
day. 

No matter what Yvonne's work might be, her 




SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 109 

black dress and blue cotton apron were always neat, 
and her blonde hair tidy under the close-fitting white 
cap of the Norman peasant woman. At five in the 
morning Yvonne was up and shuffling about the house 
in her black, cloth slippers, slipping them into wooden 
sabots when she went out of doors, and as conscien- 
tiously dropping them off again at the door before 




stepping on her spotless floors, as does the Moham- 
medan shed his shoes before the sacred mosque. 

On pleasant days we ate out of doors in delightful 
French country fashion, and Yvonne served three 
daily meals under the apple trees with never a grum- 
ble about the extra work that this entailed. She did 
the marketing, ran errands, gave the orders and was 
a competent " buffer " between us and the daily fric- 
tion in dealings with the butcher, the baker and others 
of their ilk. The few sous that may have been 



no THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

diverted into her own pocket by the process were 
only her just dues — which, to tell the truth, was ex- 
actly the way she looked at it. 

Yvonne was not perfection. She was unduly 
voluble, not at all truthful, and her manners, to more 
conventional housekeepers, might have seemed free 
and easy; but the French servant is pliable to an 
extent unintelligible to the starched English maid, and 
is not always clogging the domestic machinery by 
stopping to define the exact boundaries of her do- 
main. When there was nothing else to do Yvonne 
would polish off the brass and rub down the body- 
work of the automobile which was housed in the 
ancient stable. 

Nothing so accentuates the difference between 
country life in France and that of neighbouring Eng- 
land as the superiority of the French local resources. 
Each petit pays, or community, is self-supporting and 
self-contained. In the chief town a weekly market 
focusses the produce of the surrounding villages and 
farms, both for the convenience of the local buyer 
and for distribution to points further away. 

Every Monday afternoon Yvonne, armed with 
her black, straw-covered basket, went to the market 
in the place of La Grande Ville. She would bar- 
gain with keenness and relish for the week's supplies 
up and down the long line of market women sitting 
sphinx-like before their heaped up baskets. Here, 
in covered booth and under widespread umbrellas, 
nearly everything could be found, from live stock to 
drygoods, and from flowers to scrap-iron. This was 



SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES m 

our bonne's only day off, nor would she have wanted 
any better holiday than this weekly tilt in wits and 
the opportunity it gave for gossip. 

Only recently a law has been passed in France 
providing for a repos hebdomadaire, which entitles 
every employee to a day of rest, but so far the 
French servant has rarely availed herself of it. 
" Mon Dieu, que faire," she exclaims, and simply 
shrugs her shoulders and goes about her work as 
usual. 

Beside the weekly market there came to our door 
each morning the marchands de quatre saisons (so 
called from the fact that they handle the products of 
the four seasons), peasant women with push-carts 
of vegetables and fruits from the outlying farms. 
They are well-named; no matter what might be the 
time of the year their supply of green stuff was abun- 
dant and varied, thanks to the French system of in- 
tensive gardening, which is being recognised as the 
best exponent of that art the world over. Winter 
had its salads no less than summer, nor was one 
dependent upon the long garden list of escaroles and 
romaines at any time, for the peasant woman of 
Normandy can go out into the fields and grub up, 
what, to the uninitated, would be regarded only as 
weeds, and bring them into the market in the form 
of most appetising salads. Notable among such 
was the tender, white shoots of the dandelion from 
under the young wheat, the de luxe variety of the 
ordinary dandelion salad. Asparagus was a spe- 
cialty of the neighbourhood, and haricots verts, which 



112 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

might be labelled as the vegetable of the French, 
were grown by the square acre in the neighbourhood. 
One particularly sheltered garden supplied our table 
with strawberries, including the higly prized white 
variety of Normandy, from April until December. 
Another fruit that seemed to come to stay was the 
cherry, which can take its place along with the 
haricots verts in the affections of the French house- 
keeper. But on the whole the French fruits do not 
rank with their vegetables. 

In spite of the fact that a tax had to be paid on 
all produce brought within the village limits — the 
octroi tax, that like a belt is tightly drawn about 
every French town — prices were reasonable, and 
there was no attempt at rivalling those of the city 
markets. 

Normandy is the dairy of France, and is the home 
of the best milk, butter, and the most varied number 
of cheeses produced on French soil, so we fared very 
well in this particular, though the milk came in the 
unhygienic tin milk-can of the dark ages of house- 
keeping (milk in bottles not having penetrated be- 
yond the confines of some of the large cities), but its 
quality, at eight cents the litre, as well as that of the 
unsalted butter, could not be excelled. 

In the warm months our dairy woman, for it is 
usually the woman who is the vendor about the 
French countryside, brought also the cceur de la creme } 
temptingly laid out on a bed of grape leaves — 
a small, home-made cream cheese, which takes its 
name from its heart-shaped basket moulds. Then 



SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 113 

there were the numerous family of Norman cheeses 
to draw upon — the world-renowned Camembert, 
Gournay, the delicate, sweet Gervais, while the little 
browns jugs of the rich Crime d'higny were also 
one of the products of our pays, the Pont I'Eveque, 




the Brie and the Port Saiut coming from a little 
farther away. 

Poultry and eggs came from an island just oppo- 
site us, and the cheerful cackle that floated across 
the water in no way suggested the " cold storage " 
fowls only too prevalent these days in our own city 
markets. It was here that Yvonne went when in 
search of a particularly fine poulet de grain — one 
that had been properly fattened on corn, or a basket 
of fresh-laid eggs, rowing there and back in Mon- 
sieur I'avocat's old fishing punt. 



ii4 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

Fowls, Yvonne would always roast on the broche 
before the open fire, which was nearly lost in one 
end of the huge chimney, in preference to the in- 
competent stove, as she did also the gigot (always 
with a tange of garlic), the leg of mutton that takes 
the place on the French menu of that occupied by 
roast beef on the English dinner table. 

Nor were we entirely dependent upon La Grande 
Ville for household odds and ends. A well-stocked 
shop in the village itself sold a little of every- 
thing from gasolene for the automobile to fishing 
poles and bait. There was a woman cordonnier who 
could re-sole shoes as well as her masculine com- 
petitors. A well-appointed butcher's shop, flying its 
insignia — a red cloth at the doorway — furnished 
good beef, mutton, lamb and veal at as reasonable 
rates as could be expected in a land where one must 
expect to pay well for good meat. There was com- 
petition in the bonlangerie business, and we had sev- 
eral varieties of rolls, as well as brioches, for the Sun- 
day breakfast, and as a treat even pastry on fete days. 

We employed a blanchisseuse, not a laveuse. The 
distinction means much to one's clothes. The 
laveuse is the ordinary washerwoman who takes one's 
linen to the river bank, or any convenient bit of 
water, lays the clothes on a board, and pounds out 
the dirt with a wooden paddle. By this process in 
time one's wearing apparel is riddled with small 
holes, as if bird-shot had gone through it. Whereas 
the blanchisseuse does her work in tubs on her own 
premises, and also frequently irons, the two accom- 



SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 115 

plishments, however, not necessarily going together. 
The work is usually well done, and one's shirtwaists 
cost one-half, and often a third of what they would 
in America, with everything else in proportion, 
though the pernicious use of lessive, or lye, has 
naturally a bad effect upon one's linen in time. 

All good housekeepers in Normandy make their 
own cider. From October through November the 
village cider-press travels from house to house, and 
the air is heavy with the acrid scent of crushed 
apples. We followed the example of our neighbours 
and engaged a burly, blue-bloused Norman man-of- 
all-work for three francs for the day to set up the 
press in our garden and turn our crop of apples into 
the golden beverage of Normandy. The procedure 
was simple enough. The right mixture of tart and 
sweet apples were first cut up in a chopping machine 
and then packed tightly into the press. Warm water 
was poured in and allowed to drip through, after 
which the apples were pressed dry. The liquid was 
put into barrels and stowed away in the dark cellar, 
for no French house is without its cave — and eight 
days later was supposed to be ready to use; but 
Norman cider must be mellow to be enjoyed; even 
at its best it is a bit sour and thin even to the palate 
accustomed only to ice-water. 

Why did we ever leave such a paradise might 
well be asked? Procrastination was our undoing. 
We could have bought our house and the four acres 
of land attached for something less than a couple 
of thousand dollars, and did seriously think of be- 



n6 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

coming permanent householders in La Petite Ville, 
but while dallying with the idea, little dreaming of 
any need for haste, we went off for a six weeks' 
jaunt through Holland and Belgium and came back 
to find that a small " boom " had burst upon the 
village. Monsieur I'avocat had been offered what 
seemed to him a fabulous amount for the property 
and had closed the bargain. Ultimately the vandal 
purchaser tore down the house and put up what was 
even worse than the " villa coquette " — an imitation 
old Norman house. 

In disgust, when our lease was up, we shook the 
dust of La Petite Ville off of our feet, and so it was 
that when the housekeeping germ began its deadly 
work again, it found us by the shores of the blue 
Mediterranean. 




^L,VILLA 
onffle 
^ MED ITERRANEAN 




We sat around our studio fire making plans for 
the winter. The cold fogs of autumn were wrapping 
Paris in their clammy folds. A Paris fog has not 
the consistency of that of London, but it has a chill 
of its own, and Paris has by far less adequate pro- 
vision for keeping warm than any city in Europe. 

" We will winter on the Riviera, in a villa," was 
the decision, " and be fashionable." 

The most chic, exclusive winter amusement of all 




o 






SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 117 

Europe is the wintering in a Riviera villa, on the 
shores of the blue Mediterranean, which by the 
poetic Frenchman is described as " a beautiful woman 
in a blue gown." Ah, but gowns cost money, even 
to look at sometimes ! Would not even a modest 
villa loom to too expensive proportions on this en- 
chanted shore, the modern garden of the Hesperides, 
where the golden apples are indeed golden. 

How to find out ! We took the obvious course 
and got the addresses of various house agents, be- 
ginning at Marseilles and running along the coast to 
Cannes, Nice and Menton. The experience opened 
up vistas of foreign business methods which were 
anything but practical, for some never answered our 
queries at all, while others had not yet returned from 
the holidays in the mountains — and so made the fact 
known to us by a brief message written on a picture 
post-card from some retreat in the mountains where 
they were spending their time trying to catch trout. 

Our modest demand for something habitable 
which could shelter two people and an automobile 
was met by others who offered us palatial chateaux 
with everything to match, including the price. One 
quoted a rental of fifty thousand francs for three 
months, for which we were to have a spacious de- 
mure surrounded by ten acres of gardens and com- 
posed of twelve bed and dressing-rooms, boudoirs, 
billiard room, a " winter garden," endless halls and 
salons and servants' quarters, and as many as two ( ?) 
bathrooms, with gas and electricity, running water, 
an entrance lodge, two garages and a boathouse. 



u8 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

Certainly the price was not high for what was offered. 
It was the automobile that did it, for when we stipu- 
lated for a garage it was hard to convince them that 
four additional rooms were enough. 

" It is easy to see what class of Americans they 
take us for, or do they think that we want to run a 
hotel," said the Man in disgust. " We'll go house- 
hunting by automobile and investigate any, and every, 
place that we pass on the road that has a sign a louer 
hanging in front of it," and so we decided forthwith. 

Two days down by road from Paris, and we turned 
eastward at Marseilles and plunged gaily into the 
real Riviera over the famous Route d'ltalie which 
links up Paris with the Italian frontier. 

From Marseilles on to Menton at the edge of Italy 
is the villa region of Europe. They are not con- 
verted villas — the made-over palaces, desecrated con- 
vents and mouldy ruins that the searcher after the 
old usually associated with the word " villa " in 
Italy. These villas of the French Riviera are newly 
built, new for Europe at least, for it is only within 
the last quarter of a century that this exploitation 
has begun, and within the last ten that it has become 
internationally popular. To-day the boom is fairly 
on. One pleasing result is that what is lost in an- 
tiquity is made up to the housekeeper in a comfort 
such as is rarely successfully grafted on to the monu- 
mental palaces of other days. 

Villas were dotted along the grey flanks of the 
mountains that rise here from the sea; they are 
perched on rocky crags, smothered in orange groves 



SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 119 

and surrounded by sweet-scented gardens of exotic 
shrubs, and built on purple and ochre rocks out into 
the water. White most of them, or of shell tints 
and of what might be styled Mediterranean archi- 
tecture — a blend of Moorish in open colonnades, of 
Spanish in the flat, projecting tile roofs, of Italy in 
the stucco walls and conventional balustrades, with 
here and there just a dash of French coquetry to 
give them the piquancy demanded by the exigencies 
of the gay life that goes on within the delicately 
tinted walls. 

The correct type of Riviera villa must always have 
a brilliant frieze stencilled in colours just up under 
the roof, usually of a design of gaudy flowers, a 
decorative Italian idea, which is very charming, and 
turquoise blue porcelain ornaments play a prominent 
part in the exterior decoration. 

They were fancifully named, all of these villas, in 
bold letters on the gate-post, and though the villa, 
" My Darling," seemed rather too personal as an 
address, the villa, " Mary and Martha," suggested 
that both the material and spiritual welfare of the 
household was cared for. 

We succeeded in getting much more information 
in personal interviews with the house agents. Busi- 
ness by correspondence is not one of the strong points 
of the foreigner. 

Nice being the hub and the metropolis of the 
Riviera, offered the greatest choice compared to other 
places. Furnished villas, the only kind to hire, on 
account of the expense of moving household goods, 



120 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

varied from five hundred dollars to five thousand 
for a season. This was according to size, and that 
desideratum of the Riviera — location. 

Small villas! Oh, that was another story. There 
were some that rented from three to six hundred 
dollars, but they were scarce and had been spotted 
and grabbed up by the first of October. 

Furnished apartments might have been had at 
similar prices, or the finer new ones that are making 
Nice as convenient to live in as Paris, at Paris 
prices, if that was what one was looking for. Not 
so with us; we had come for a villa, and a villa or 
some detached substitute, therefore, we would have. 
These prices were for the Riviera season of three 
months, from the last of January to the last of 
April. 

The rent, in most cases, included the linen, china 
and silver, or what passes for silver, but not the 
water. Your water bill depends upon yourself and 
the use you make of that commodity. 

Conditions were much the same at Menton, 
though the tendency was towards lower prices, and 
small villas set in groves of lemon trees were not 
unknown at three and six hundred dollars for the 
season. But they were all taken. " Yes," we were 
assured by complacent agents, " it is becoming more 
difficult each year to secure just what is wanted, the 
demand for villas is steadily increasing." So we 
were finding out. 

In the charming, rose-bowered peninsula of An- 
tibes, living was not so dear, and we had the satisfac- 



SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 121 

tion of learning that water went with the rent, but 
that it was the " habitude " to rent out such acces- 
sories as linen, silver and china as " extras." 

These distinctions were interesting, but we were 
using up a lot of oil and gasolene and not coming 
up with the special brand of villa, suitable to artistic 
and literary needs of modest financial capacity. 

At Cannes we were offered charming and extensive 
places that had been hallowed by having been the 
residences of Russian Grand Dukes, German Heredi- 
tary Princes or English Earls, seemingly the principal 
frequenters of this delightful Mediterranean town 
that caters for the noblesse. All this tended to ad- 
vance prices, so they were not for us. It was use- 
less even to demand prices ; we were getting beyond 
the stage where this amused us. 

" We might as well turn around and begin at the 
other end," said the Man. So we rushed the mag- 
nificent roadway over the red Esterels into Saint 
Raphael, where there were charming villas to be 
had, " patronised by Americans," we were told. 
The new golf links and palace villas under the par- 
asol pines of Valescure were tempting, but beyond our 
limit as to price. 

A run through the cork forests of the " Maures," 
and we dropped down into Hyeres, the first or last 
Riviera resort — it depends from which way you 
come. 

Just a few miles away, down on the coast, where a 
fringe of wind-tossed rock pines overhang the Medi- 
terranean, is a little village of a single hotel, a few 



122 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

fishermen's houses, a wine-shop — little else. Here 
we found our villa. 

The renting was in the hands of the proprietor of 
the hotel. The villa Beau Soleil was built on the 
usual casual architectural lines peculiar to these Med- 
iterranean countries — rough stones, stuccoed white 
with a pinkish-orange roof of tiles. Solid green 
shutters rendered it as impenetrable as a fortress. 
On its gable, which was the front, was painted a 
golden sun, and in its centre the name. A white 
balustraded terrace, without which no Riviera villa 
is complete, overhung the water and was roofed with 
interlaced dry bamboo canes in the fashion of the 
country. 

The villa was of bungalow construction, so com- 
mon to the country houses about the Mediterranean, 
called variously bastides and cabanons. There were 
four living-rooms and the usual big kitchen, designed 
for people who in winter use the one end of the 
kitchen as a sitting-room. There was one room 
under the golden sun in which we housed our one 
servant. The open terrace gave us a charming out- 
of-doors living-room where we could set up the liter- 
ary and artistic shop. Here, too, we dined, literally 
under our own vine and fig-tree that tempered the 
rays of the southern sun. 

That the boathouse could be used for a garage 
was the deciding point in the favour of Beau Soleil. 
Here the Man might tinker when he felt inclined. 
We took the villa for twelve months (no Riviera 
season here) for the moderate rental, furnished, of 



SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 123 

eight hundred francs a year, say a hundred and sixty 
dollars. The hotel patron wrote out a curious and 
informal lease on an old-fashioned ruled letter sheet 
of -papier timbre with the dregs of the ink bottle 
eked out with water. It seemed a crazy document 
but never gave us any trouble. 

The cool, white-washed walls of the rooms were 
in pleasing contrast with the red-tiled floors, and 
suggested the repose of a convent cell, which delusion 
was helped out by the spare amount of furnishings, 
but there were some old pieces of Provengal furniture, 
some great .armoires and cupboards, ornamented with 
huge, ornate steel locks and hinges, and a panetier, 
the hanging cupboard for bread, and below it the 
trough-like table in which the bread was supposed to 
be made. These two pieces of furniture to-day serve 
only the purposes of collectors, and drift chiefly to 
the antique shops of Paris, Avignon and Marseilles. 
There were several mirrors of indifferent reflecting 
ability, but with charming though tarnished gold 
frames. 

The matter of household supplies was not an 
onerous one. Hyeres was well supplied with shops by 
reason of its prominence as one of the most popular, 
though not one of the gayest, of the Riviera resorts. 
The invaluable Potin had a branch here, and there 
were even some American and English goods stocked. 
Outside of the big cities the demand for these Amer- 
ican products is so intermittent that they are apt to 
be stale and the style old-fashioned, but certain of 
them could be made to serve once and again. 



124 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

With the automobile we did our own delivering, 
otherwise we would have gone without. As we were 
in the garden spot of Europe for fruits and veg- 
etables, from which supplies are drawn for northern 
Europe, contrary to what might usually be expected, 
we found them cheap and plentiful at all seasons. 
They were picturesquely brought around to our door 




loaded in basket panniers swung across lazy, small 
donkeys, or in carts, guided by women whose sun- 
baked faces were shielded by flapping straw hats 
with conical crowns bound with black velvet bands. 
Our maid was a Provencal, who came from the 
neighbourhood of Aries, and wore proudly the cos- 



SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 125 

tume of that pays. The tiny ribbon coiffe and shawl 
fichu and the uneconomic black dress that the labour- 
ing classes all over Europe cling to, clothed the girl 
most agreeably, and coming from the most demo- 
cratic region of Europe, the " Midi " of France, she 
treated us as equals without embarrassment. She 
was a charming, handsome, warm-hearted creature 
who felt it her duty to entertain us socially in her 
rests between labours. 

Celestine worked hard and faithfully, though with- 
out any system. She cooked in the nondescript 
Mediterranean style, a little more so if anything, 
which like its architecture is a composite of all the 
attributes of the various warm countries bordering 
upon it. 

How Celestine cooked even as well as she did was 
a never ceasing marvel. The kitchen range was a 
high platform of brick under a hooded chimney. 
The fire was built on top and there were sundry little 
depressions into which coals were dropped and over 
which casseroles stewed dreamily away. The pin- 
tard — guinea hen — was the bird of the country, and 
when Celestine roasted it on a broach before the fire 
of grapevine stems, as well as rows of tiny greves 
(which were certainly sparrows) strung on a long 
skewer, heads flapping in a horrible, life-like way 
with the motion of the slow-turning broach, we usu- 
ally withdrew and let Celestine eat these. We bar- 
gained with one of the fishermen to bring us fish for 
the daily bouillabaisse, that Mediterranean fish stew 
to be had at its best, and in its only true form, when 



126 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

made of the celebrated rock fish of the Mediterra- 
nean, and has plenty of yellow saffron, garlic, herbs 
and oil bestrewn upon it; either this or it is not 
bouillabaisse at all. Lapin garenne, stewed rabbit, 
with a thick wine sauce, is another specialty of Celes- 
tine's, and we sometimes longed for the " plain " 




cooking of England, though indeed the girl's art was 
a marvel. 

Lamb was our main dependence for meat, and 
goat's milk was all that we could get in the way of 
lacteal fluid, save a concoction sold by the itinerant 
milkman who would mix sheep's milk with it. Wine 
was cheap and good, costing by the barrel five sous 
a litre, double that for something better. Our 
shortage on milk had to be made up on wine. 

After luncheon in the warm, drowsy afternoon, 
Celestine would take her sewing out under the olive 



SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 127 

trees, or weave the flat, round baskets used by the 
olive presser, which we found, incidentally, made 
very good mats for the terrace. Always at such 
times her head would be covered with several hand- 
kerchiefs, for fear of a coup de soldi; when it was 
cool she sat with her feet on a tin chauffrette full of 
live coals. Celestine and her mode of life was more 
interesting to us than ourselves, and on the whole we 
enjoyed her and profited by her acquaintance. 

All water had to be brought from the village, and 
as for baths, the Mediterranean alone served as our 
tub. The baker at Hyeres sent us out each day a 
collection of the queer, lumpy loaves known as the 
"pain d'Aix," that is, when he didn't forget it; at 
other times we cranked up the automobile and went 
in search of them ourselves, bringing back on the side 
an occasional sack of " boulets," or compressed coal 
dust, in morsels about the size of an egg. These 
black-diamond eggs Celestine burned in the fire which 
heated up the brick oven on certain occasions, and so 
far as they went did really give out an efficient heat, 
though truly they proved expensive. 

Without the automobile, housekeeping in our Med- 
iterranean villa would hardly have been a practical 
success. 

Celestine washed our clothes in the big stone tank 
of water at the end of the garden. This was divided 
into two compartments, one for the washing and one 
for the rinsing, and she got fairly good results, con- 
sidering that she used only cold water and olive oil 
soap. We had a repasseuse come in to prevent 



128 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

Celestine giving us the household linen ironed in 
French country fashion by being pulled out and 
folded, rough dry. 

All through the warm spring nights the nightin- 
gales trilled in the olive trees of our garden, while 
the light of the moon, big as a balloon, made a broken 
path of beaten gold across the water. Idyllic days 
those when we sat on the terrace, in broken light 
and shade, soothed by the chant of the cigale — the 
thermometer of southern France — sky and water a 
symphony in blue, fanned by the warm breezes from 
the African coast, and watching the orange sails of 
the fishing boats drift around the violet headlands 
of Cap Sicie and Porquerolles. 

" Is this what you would call a fashionable win- 
ter?" asked the Man, coming up from the boat- 
house, where he had been tinkering with the automo- 
bile, wearing the blue cotton overalls of a French 
mechanic, grease up to his elbows. 

Celestine had just come from the fountain, bring- 
ing the evening supply of water, and was resting the 
two big, green pottery cruches beside the monumental 
gateway, while she flirted amiably with the boy who 
had led up his flock of brown and white goats to 
deliver the milk, piping to them as do the shepherds 
still to their flocks on the grey-green hills of Greece. 

" Well," I said, looking back at the Colle Noir 
that formed our mountain background, and across 
to where two mammoth hotels reared their half-mile 
of colonnaded white fronts above the pines of Mont 
des Ojseaux; "there's the Costabelle Hotel just yon- 



SOME HOUSEKEEPING EXPERIENCES 129 

der that popular superstition says you can't get in at 
for less than twenty-five francs a day (what is nearer 
the truth is, you probably could not get away for 
less than fifty francs a day) , whose guests are spend- 
ing their days on the golf links and their nights 
at the bridge table, and two-thirds of them have 




English titles. Again, over there is San Salvadour, 
patronised by the French noblesse and the American 
millionairesses, where those of the guests who have 
not come in their own automobiles are renting them 
from a Hyeres garage at two hundred dollars a 
week. That cloud of dust you see up the road was 
just left by the motor car of the grandest of Russian 
Grand Dukes taking a run over from Cannes, and 



130 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

besides," warming to the subject, " do we not go to 
the one ourselves and eat through a ten-course dinner 
when Celestine slips up in her good judgment and 
gives us a combination of all the exotic peculiarities 
of this region, such as moules, oursins, rabbit, aioli 
and greves the same day, and to the other for after- 
noon tea when we want gay society? How much 
more of the fashionable world would you expect at 
our present cost of living per capita — one American 
dollar a day? " 

" I don't suppose you include those teas and din- 
ners up at these mountain hostelries in the estimate, 
do you?" murmured the Man as he went to the 
washing arrangement in the garden to rinse the grease 
and dirt from his hands by a liberal dousing in real 
olive oil. I did not answer, but I knew that I had 
made my point, that it was just such contrasts as 
these that make up the charms of experimental house- 
keeping abroad. Those dinners and teas were ex- 
tras, mere amusements not at all necessary to an 
enjoyable existence. 

" Say, do you know?" said the Man, reappearing 
with immaculate hands. " I think there is money 
to be made exploiting olive oil as a dirt remover." 




r rave//er 



//e 



AS THE ITALIAN HOTEL PROPRIETOR SEES HER 

ONEROUS PROFESSION OF TOURIST 

SOCIABLE AMERICANS 

THROUGH THE FOREIGN CUSTOM HOUSE 

BLOOMSBURY BOARDING-HOUSE 

LIFE IN LODGINGS 

ENGLISH PRIVATE HOTEL 

PAYING GUEST 

AMUSEMENTS IN AN ANCIENT CHATEAU 

ENGLISH RAILWAY STATIONS 

RAILWAY TRAVEL IN THE BRITISH ISLES 

PENSIONS VS. HOTELS 

EUROPEAN BOARDING-HOUSE 

FRENCH PENSION 

BOARDING IN A FRENCH FAMILY 

IN A " HOTEL-MEUBLE " 

PARIS RESTAURANTS 

OMINOUS SIGN OF THE HORSE'S HEAD 

WOMAN TRAVELLER AND THE EUROPEAN HOTEL 

THE CASE OF THE FRENCHMAN 

BERLIN COMPETES WITH PARIS 

CONTINENTAL RAILWAYS 

TRAVELLING COMPANIONS 



V 

THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER 

The proprietor of a well-known tourist hotel in one 
of the large Italian cities, whose clientele is largely 
composed of the independent woman traveller, un- 
burdened himself in an expansive moment, of his 
impressions of this large class of Americans abroad. 
He had been fifty years in the business and had 
seen the American woman come into her own in his 
country, and was in a position to form an opinion 
as to the success with which she had managed this 
particular end of her European tour. 

" Ah, they are wonderful women, these Ameri- 
can women," he said contemplatively. " They are 
wonderful; I watch them come and go; they are 
very interesting; so calm; so composed; they know 
just what they want; but the most wonderful thing 
about them is, the ease with which they can put any- 
thing from them which they do not like. They 
do not take it to heart, they do not worry over it, 
they simply put it to one side and go their way." 

It is this quality, the ignoring of what is not 
wanted, the disagreeable, and going about their busi- 
ness, that makes for the security and confidence which 
are the characteristics which mark the American 
woman abroad, married or single, young or old. 

133 



134 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

When the lone woman traveller leaves her steamer 
and stands before some doorway to Europe for the 
first time, she sometimes finds herself in the midst 
of a confusion of ideas as well as a confusion of 
tongues. 

She has left home with a clear-cut idea of what she 
wants to do and see, but about twenty different peo- 
ple on shipboard have given her as many different 
kinds of advice. If she can but realise it, every por- 
ter, cabby and hotel waiter is waiting for her com- 
ing, and if she will but put herself in the hands of 
the great army of those who cater to the wants and 
needs of the tourist, she will be passed along as 
expeditiously and safely as a bale of merchandise. 

Her type has become as well recognised, and she 
is catered for equally as well as the large party who 
orders a suite of rooms in advance, usually at ad- 
vanced prices. 

The profession of tourist means a lot of hard 
work. It's not raptures and roses all along the way. 
If the average tour abroad was made compulsory 
what a howl would go up from many a wanderer. 
Most people take more exercise in a few months of 
travel than they do in years at home. They reverse 
their way of living, crowd their stomachs with strange 
food, and their bags grow steadily heavier with fool- 
ish souvenirs, and in the multiplying of new brain 
cells, in the tussle with several samples of languages, 
that poor organ gets as sore as a set of unused mus- 
cles. The lone woman has all sorts of fears. She 
is as nervous as a cat trying to get across a 



THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER 135 

street. Will she be lonely; who will she have to 
talk to ? 

For a fact, if she can get out of the sound of an 
American voice she will be lucky. The sights of 
Europe are obscured by her compatriots. It is also 
easy to attach oneself to a party. The American 
likes nothing better than to travel in bunches, through 
sociability and, perhaps, a certain lack of confidence. 
Anyway, they are to be seen all over the country in 
parties, that, like a snowball rolling along, grows in 
size at every pension and hotel it comes to, until 
it finally becomes too unwieldy to be housed and 
moved about. 

Here is just where there occurs much loss of 
time and not a little friction : It is impossible not to 
be so in a crowd of a dozen or more women with an 
easy-going man or two> in the background. The 
American man rather regards the trip abroad, as he 
does religion and society, as the particular province 
of his womankind, and is usually quite willing that 
she should lead the attacking force against the for- 
eigner and his language, which attitude still further 
mystifies that perplexed individual in his efforts to 
understand his American clientele. 

There is a first loneliness and strangeness which 
clutches the lone woman traveller, a sort of land- 
sickness which must be gone through with as is sea- 
sickness, but once the crisis is passed she will be in 
a fairer way to enjoy herself than if she was tagged 
to any group of people, no matter how agreeable 
they might appear. 



136 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

Even in linking up the most desirable of com- 
panions en voyage, one should be in a position to 
throw off the line readily and be able to part con- 
veniently, pleasantly and easily. 

Once the ship arrives on the other side the steward 
carries her hand-baggage off the steamer onto the 
dock, or to the tender which takes the passengers 
ashore. He has become as an old friend, and she 
almost clings to him when she gives the parting tip. 
The native porter is at the landing stage and 
seizes her bags to carry into the nearby custom 
house, where eventually her trunks arrive by some 
mysterious means. 

Customs examinations are perfunctory in most 
cases, and as a rule merely amount to the trouble 
of unlocking a single trunk or bag. An official, in 
some cases with gloved hands (we are behind in this 
thing at home), ruffles up a corner of a tray and asks 
the conventional question, which is composed on 
about the same formula in every country — whether 
you have cigarettes, cigars, matches, perfumery or 
spirituous liquors, the articles customs officials seem 
most keen about. In an equally perfunctory way 
he chalks your luggage, and the waiting porter (he 
will wait, if he is not tipped, until the end of the 
world) gathers up everything and shows the way to 
the ticket-office. The woman traveller follows to 
where her trunks must be registered (checked), and 
any excess over the usual sixty pounds or thereabouts 
must be paid for, as well as a small fee for regis- 
tration. 



THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER 137 

She takes the receipt and the porter now takes 
her and the hand-luggage to the train (or into the 
cab or taxi that is to carry her to a hotel), which is 
waiting to meet the steamer, finds her a seat, puts the 
bags in the rack above her head — and then awaits his 
reward. If he has done all this — as he should have 
done — a tip of the value of twenty-five to fifty cents 




U^ 



should be given him. The point is to make one's 
porter stay by and do the business. He will never 
lose you or your baggage as long as the tip is still 
ahead of him. 

Usually the lone woman traveller comes by way 
of England, where she can talk in a language ap- 
proximating her own. Her destination is usually a 
boarding house in Bloomsbury or Kensington. 
Around Bloomsbury, with the British Museum as 
a nucleus, has sprung up, in the last fifteen years, 



138 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

a rank and file of boarding houses which are filled 
from May to September with unattached American 
women, and a few scattering, subdued men. 

The Bloomsbury boarding house is like most 
things in older London — just a little dingy; but the 
proprietor — who is generally a woman of the severe 
British matron type — usually knows her business and 
tries to her utmost to please Americans, even giving 
them as nearly an American breakfast as she can 
concoct. 

The London boarding house is supposedly cheap, 
and can actually be made fairly so if one arranges 
for room and breakfast only, and shops around for 
meals in connection with sight-seeing. Such accom- 
modation can often be had from a guinea to thirty 
shillings a week. As the American has usually noth- 
ing but praise for the London boarding house, this 
speaks well for its attempt to cater for this special 
class of customers. 

The English themselves still cling to the habit of 
lodgings. Life in lodgings, it must be confessed, 
is a singularly lonely existence, but if one wants to 
get an insight into one phase of life in the British 
Isles, such as they will not find elsewhere, it can be 
made quite an amusing and instructive experience. 
More especially is this so when one " goes into lodg- 
ings," as they say, in some small country town. 

One is not risking anything to* go on a hunt for 
" lodgings " and trust to luck to find what is wanted. 
Any attractive typical small English house, with a 
little garden and a neat appearance that puts out the 



THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER 139 

sign " Lodgers Wanted," will, in nine cases out of 
ten, prove to be an attractive place for a sojourn. 

Life in lodgings is peculiar; you make arrange- 
ments for your rooms, say a bedroom and a sitting- 
room, for so much a week, which includes having 
your meals cooked and served to you in your own 
sitting-room. But you must do the marketing your- 
self, unless you shirk this and throw the responsibility 
upon the landlady, though as an experience it is well 
worth doing oneself. You can get acquainted with 
the local butcher and have a struggle to keep him 
from cutting off a third more steak than you order 
(it is never less), and you will soon get acquainted 
with the limitations of the greengrocer. Marketing 
in a foreign country has educational advantages, and 
when you are looking up your food each day, just 
for fun, it has nothing in common with the monotony 
of ordinary housekeeping. 

There is something very Dickensesque about "lodg- 
ings," but they are not half bad, and give the ad- 
vantages of a home with the omissions of a few of 
the shortcomings. If there are other lodgers in 
the same house one is not brought in contact with 
them in any way, but it is a constant source of won- 
der to the practical-minded American — this unprac- 
tical and labour-making method of catering to peo- 
ple. " Lodgings " can be made as expensive or cheap 
as one wishes, but their virtue usually lies in their use- 
fulness for small incomes. 

The private hotel is another British institution, 
and is really a glorified lodging house on hotel lines, 



HO THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

except, of course, one does not have to buy their 
provisions; meals are served to you alone in a private 
dining-room at any hour you wish, or privately in the 
public dining-room, all of which makes for the ex- 
clusiveness so dear to the Britisher at home or abroad. 
The private hotel is apt to be very good indeed, and 
it should be, for it is quite as expensive as any aver- 
age type of hotel. This would naturally be the case, 
where one pays for special service and special priv- 
ileges, and there is no question about the protection 
it affords to the timid woman traveller; any unpleas- 
ant experiences that could break through the barriers 
of life in one of these hotels, usually occupied by the 
most orthodox family parties, would have to be engi- 
neered by a very bold, bad and determined person. 

A more intimate alternative is to become a paying 
guest in an English family. Their advertisements 
are to be found in all the weekly journals for women 
readers. From some points of view these advertise- 
ments are often quaint. 

" A clergyman's family would be glad to take as a 
paying guest a lady fond of country sports, of a 
sociable disposition, who would lend herself to being 
a pleasant companion — a good tennis player " ; or, 
" One who is musical is preferred — and to do her 
part in the entertainment; prices to be mutually 
agreed upon, or terms arranged by letter." 

One is really treated as a guest and is only re- 
minded of her true position by the weekly or monthly 
bill rendered. All of this — if you avail yourself of 
such an opportunity — places one in the difficult posi- 



THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER 141 

tion of self-analysis. Are you social? Are you en- 
tertaining? What would happen if you did not fill 
the bill? Would your money be refunded? These 
arrangements seem to work, in England in a way that 
does not seem possible elsewhere. 

The French have caught the fever, and "paying 
guest," like many English words, is incorporated in 
every-day usage. 

You can be invited to become a paying guest in an 
ancient chateau in the veritable Chateau Country, 
where there are boar and stag hunts bi-weekly. 
This may be a little strong for the ladies, to be sure, 
but another chatelaine of a chateau will receive one 
and give lessons in the language as well as social 
advantages in addition to board and lodging. That 
is milder! 

The small English country railway station, with its 
neat garden, is a model of its kind in outward looks 
at least, but the big stations of the cities are par- 
ticularly unattractive. Each class has its waiting- 
room, all equally dingy and that of the first none too 
good to make use of even if one's ticket is second 
class. One penny is charged for use of the lavatory 
— a universal custom in Europe at any public toilet. 

The train-guard can usually be bribed with a shil- 
ling or half a crown to slap a " reserved " label on 
the window of one's compartment and thus keep out 
others, though the lone woman does not want too 
much exclusiveness- — a crowd is safer. Without a 
tip the guard can be made to put on a " ladies only " 
sign on the window if there is no compartment so 



H2 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

labelled already, but it is just as well to take travel- 
ling conditions as one finds them. At one's destina- 
tion you go with the porter to the van to sort out 
the trunks. It looks easy to go off with anybody's 
baggage, but it is seldom that baggage is lost or goes 
astray. 

On the through express trains there are imita- 
tion, or miniature, Pullman cars, satisfactory enough 
— as imitations — but not at all to be compared in 
comfort with the real thing. There are also first- 
and third-class dining-cars. The best trains on which 
to travel third class in Great Britain are the Scotch 
expresses, second class having been abolished and the 
third considerably improved. 

You keep warm with a primitive zinc foot-warmer 
filled with hot water, and even so, you frequently 
have to tip to get one. If you wish to convey the 
impression that you know your way about, you put 
your feet on this foot-warmer, wrap a rug about your 
knees and sit with the window wide open. In sum- 
mer the process is reversed, and the windows are 
tightly shut to keep out dust. 

When the woman traveller leaves England and 
crosses over to the lands of strange speech, her next 
stopping place is likely enough Paris and the Paris 
pension. 

The most common delusion under which the lone 
woman traveller labours is the ancient idea that a 
pension, the European boarding house, is safer than 
a hotel. Just what she means by safer is not quite 
easy to define. If what is meant is that it gives her 







C 

o 

< 






THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER 143 

more the protection of a home, she is wrong, for 
it simply increases the danger that a young girl at 
least would be exposed to. Life in this case is far 
more intimate than that of the hotel, and she is 
brought in daily contact, in a way that cannot be 
avoided, with the other inmates who might or might 
not be desirable, though she rarely has any oppor- 
tunity for knowing before she is entangled in ac- 
quaintances and friendships that ofttimes result in 
tiresome or compromising situations. The least of 
the objections of the pensions is that they are worth- 
less as time-savers, while even the best, from the very 
intimate nature of their arrangements, are breeding 
places for the most pernicious gossip, for which the 
average woman away from home makes the easiest of 
targets. 

The thing that commends the pension more than 
anything else to the economically minded, and this is 
a phase of interest to the lone woman traveller who 
often has to study her finances carefully, is that it is 
cheaper than a hotel. It is cheaper than some hotels, 
it is true, but a really first-class pension costs at least 
two dollars to two dollars and a half a day, and 
there are plenty of excellent small hotels where 
one can live for this sum or even less. Many even 
of the large purely tourist hotels make pension rates, 
that is, rates by the week or month, at a great reduc- 
tion on those for transients. The cheapest pension 
that could possibly pass muster would be seven francs 
a day, and against this is the small country inn, not 
too far from town, where pension can be got not only 



H4 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

for this amount, but very often for as little as five or 
six francs, provided one does some bargaining, and 
has an understanding and appreciation of local condi- 
tions. There is no question as to the superiority of 
the accommodation offered as between the two, and 
one should remember that the very publicity of a 
hotel is certainly safer than the promiscuous intimacy 
of the boarding-house table, where your next neigh- 
mour may be a pseudo nobleman (or what is worse, 
a real one) who wants no better sport than acquaint- 
ance with one of these charming Americans for 
whom he spreads the net of his fascinations, a net 
into which she has often so readily fallen. 

The foreign man plays the game very differently 
from what the girl has been accustomed to at home. 

The Paris pension is an institution of its class 
which may fill a want, but in most cases it is an 
unfortunate frame to choose through which to look 
at the foreign picture. Many of them are conducted 
with considerable genius by their proprietors and a 
certain respectability is presumed, whatever the sig- 
nificance that vague term may have for the twentieth- 
century American woman who is quite able to take 
care of herself, and has been since she left short 
dresses and the grammar school. 

Travel means something else besides churches, ruins 
and shops. It means the life of big and little hotels, 
dinner at a Paris boulevard restaurant or at some 
little dining place that has a world-wide reputation 
for its homely dish of sausages, or again in some little 
artists' resort. Then one goes to the cafe afterwards 



THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER 145 

for a filtre, and this makes up the round which is more 
enjoyable than that which is the lot of the woman 
who lives in a pension and has it on her mind most of 
the time that she must hurry back for lunch or dinner 
or she won't get any soup; she often loses sight of 
the fact, too, that she has wasted hours of her time 
finding the way home, and the carfare which she has 
expended has more than made up for any difference 
in price which there might have been had she made 
different arrangements. 

A pension is an uneconomical and inconvenient 
thing. It is not for eating three meals a day with 
one's own compatriots in a stuffy salle a manger in 
a Paris back-flat that one has come across to spend 
maybe hard-earned wealth and gone through the 
mental anguish of learning new monetary systems 
and struggling with several languages. Oh, those 
long tables, or even small tables, to which one comes 
with tired brain and feet after the strenuous duty 
of having looked up everything mentioned in the 
guide-book! Oh, the tales that one must listen to 
from one's feMow-pensionnaires ! What dull ex- 
changes of stale impressions, as lacking often in char- 
acter as the food! 

The purely French pension (not the international 
kind) is cheap, cheaper usually than those run by 
English-speaking persons in Paris, but to tell the 
truth they are usually conducted on lines far too 
parsimonious to suit the prodigal American. The 
problem of food supply is worked out a little too 
mathematically, and one may possibly rebel at a meat 



146 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

stew, a scrimpy salad, a bit of cheese and one indif- 
ferent pear for the midday meal. Then, too, the in- 
dependent movements of the American woman are 
often not understood by her French fellows, and 
that makes a perhaps not too pleasant gossip. 

It is far better for a young girl to go into a French 
family than to attempt the life of any pension in 
Paris, however well recommended. Just think of the 
good French families who would be pleased to take 
as a paying guest an American girl or two. At the 
not exorbitant price of ten francs a day she will have 
board and lodging en famille, be given lessons in 
French (real practical lessons), be chaperoned to the 
lectures at the Sorbonne, to such amusements as are 
deemed suitable, etc. This may appear a rather mild 
regime for the enterprising American girl, but de- 
pend upon it the family will take as much pains to 
please as if she were a real guest. They will take 
her shopping and see that she gets good value for her 
money, as few lone American women ever do; they 
will not take advantage of her but may even attempt 
to curb her extravagances and, if they are the right 
sort, the rigidness and simplicity of French home- 
life will not prove an ineffectual antidote against 
precociousness. 

It seems rather adventuresome to send the lone 
woman out on a quest for rooms in a hotel-meuble, 
but Paris is peculiarly a city of small hotels that do 
not furnish meals, where rooms can be had for three 
or four francs a day, and such, when found of a 
desired and approved quality, will give the woman 



THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER 147 

old enough to take care of herself a freedom of 
movement that she should appreciate. Especially 
might this prove to be the case if she were obliged to 
" do " Paris in a few days. 

The usual French breakfast would be served by 
the hotel, and for her other meals she could patronise 
any of the restaurants which she might come across in 
her sight-seeing. She can, in fact, do anything that 
she wishes in Paris if she behaves herself. She will 
feel most comfortable in one of the numerous Duval 
establishments which are so conveniently planted 
around the city. Here the quality of the food is of 
the best, and a good, if not a bounteous meal, can be 
had for two or three francs and a five-cent tip. 
Don't forget that at all French restaurants the diner 
pays for the convert — table linen, knives and forks — 
a matter of four or six cents or more. 

Across the Seine, over in the Latin Quarter, there 
are numbers of cheap restaurants, fairly good and 
moderate in price, many of them patronised largely 
by English-speaking students of both sexes. The air 
is thick with art talk, and the tables are usually 
crowded for a brief hour or two twice a day, some- 
times even overflowing on to the sidewalk. Other 
restaurants there are in this quarter where manners 
are more free and had best be ignored. 

No prix fixe meal in Paris (usually referred to by 
the unknowing as table d'hote) at a less price than 
three francs is to be considered for a moment. Any- 
thing less than this must be looked upon with sus- 
picion, and those establishments that advertise a 



148 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

dinner of eight courses for one franc fifty, or one 
franc seventy-five centimes, wine included; or three 
francs with a quarter of a bottle of champagne, 
should most certainly be shunned. At such establish- 
ments it is likely that the roast beef will come from 
that little shop around the corner that has a gilded 
horse's head over its doorway; the real roast beef 
comes from a butcher whose sign is a gilded steer's 
head. The sign language sometimes speaks louder 
than words. 

The hostile attitude of the American hotel to- 
wards the woman who travels alone has tinged her 
attitude and prejudiced her against the foreign hotel, 
but she need have no fear of her reception in any 
class of European hotel. There is scarcely any class 
which is not perfectly proper for her to go to, whether 
she drives up to the great tourist Grand Hotel in an 
automobile, by the common bus to the hotel of the 
country town, or walks in to the little village inn, 
with her bag in her hand. She will never be looked 
at askance, or even suspiciously, but will meet with 
the same courtesy and attention as if she was most 
conventionally chaperoned. 

If she is stared at it will most likely be out of 
simple curiosity and rarely as an impertinence, for 
the spectacle of the unchaperoned young woman is 
still a source of amazement to the foreigner, although 
along the main lines of travel he has been trained to 
accept her presence with a good grace. 

Paris is as safe for the average woman as a New 
England village, but Berlin, in her endeavour to be- 



THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER 149 

come a competitor of Paris in the affections of the 
tourist, is trying hard to get up a reputation for 
gaiety and wickedness, seeing that Paris has been 
so successful in attracting trade along these lines, and 
life and amusements in Berlin are being modelled 
more and more after those of Paris. The German 




may be more sincerely aggressive than the French- 
man, but in the case of the Frenchman it is often a 
mischievous schoolboy desire to tease the foreign 
" Miss " and see if he can give her a start, rather than 
any real deviltry; her mixture of what he considers 
boldness and prudery is very amusing to him. 



150 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

The safety of any woman lies in her own hands, 
and there is no reason why she can't tour Europe with 
only slight annoyances of a personal nature which 
fade away if ignored. 

Railway travel anywhere in Europe is disagree- 
able, but especially so in France. The construction 




of the carriages, whether of the old type with the 
door at either side, or the corridor train, where the 
movements of one person disturb every one else, is 
largely responsible for this, but the travellers so hav- 
ing the habit of making themselves " at home " en 
voyage accounts for a great deal more. 

The American woman often says, " How rude," 
while in reality it is simply thoughtlessness and a 
lack of knowledge of the ethics of travel. 

The foreigner eats most of the time while travel- 



THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER 151 

ling, often removes many of his or her garments 
and tries to shut out every breath of fresh air. He, 
or she, or the pair of them, overload the rack over 
one's head with curious, knobby packages which they 
spend most of their time taking down and putting 
up. They smuggle small dogs in under the seat, for 
which they should have bought a ticket and had car- 
ried in the baggage car. Of course one can object 
to the little beast and have it put out, but as one 
American girl harshly put it — she preferred the ani- 
mal to the people who owned it. But the English- 
woman in her own land is the real offender with the 
travelling dog, for it is usually a large one. 

The European express train with sleeping- and 
dining-car accommodations, rather cynically named 
" train de luxe," is really de luxe only in price and 
could not be made to pay a profit on even the 
most indifferent and roundabout American trunk 
lines. 

Besides the Wagon-lit, or sleeping-car, there is an 
abomination known as the fauteuil-lit, which is sim- 
ply a stuffed chair pulled out lengthwise, three to a 
compartment, with a promiscuity that is horrible even 
if one is travelling en famille. The lavatory does 
not usually deserve to be mentioned and were better 
not even entered. 

Some of the more important of the International 
Sleeping Car Co.'s trains are a bit in advance of this, 
but they are generally very crowded, expensive, in- 
adequate and being usually so light are most uncom- 
fortable at high speed. 



152 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

Usually the best express trains on the Continent, 
for which no extra fares are charged, run by night, 
and their capacity is almost invariably overcharged. 
The corridor is usually full of standing passengers, 
and the lone woman may have to spend the night 
sitting on her bag in everybody's path. Day travel 
is preferable, and the circumstances are rarely so 
pressing that a night journey cannot be avoided by 
a stop-over. 

Of course some of these annoyances and the quality 
of one's travelling companions can be improved if 
one invariably travels first class on the ordinary train, 
but the price is double that of the popular second 
class. Third-class travel is really not more objec- 
tionable than the second that the traveller usually 
patronises, and not any more crowded; it is at least 
amusing to see the people of the country, and wooden 
benches or a leather-covered seat is preferable on 
all counts to a stuffy cloth covering. There are ob- 
jections, it is true, but the herded masses of human- 
ity one now sees on European express trains to and 
from the great seaports are not far different in physi- 
ognomy. 

Railway journeys in Spain lead in inconvenience 
and tedium and give the traveller the impression of 
spending most of the time at way stations, but the 
carriages are cleaner than many of those of France 
and Italy, and in many respects the reserved Span- 
iard is a less objectionable travelling companion. 
One buys drinking water at the stations in cool, moist 
earthen jugs, an improvement on the rasping mineral 



THE LONE WOMAN TRAVELLER 153 

waters that are the only liquids beside wine that can 
be got mostly in Europe. 

The woman who does not like to be stared at 
should not go to Spain. The expected form of ex- 
pressing admiration by the Spanish man is to stare 
into a woman's face and make audible remarks, it is 
to be hoped of a flattering tenor. It is a new experi- 
ence to walk along the streets and be greeted with 
laughter and lively personal comments. 

The Italians are almost embarrassing with their 
attentions, though they take the less objectionable 
form of a childish curiosity, but in both cases it is a re- 
lief to go across the Mediterranean into north Africa. 
Even to the most untamed outer post of tourism — 
Tangiers. Yes, Tangiers, too, is all right for the 
lone woman, who can live in a tourist hotel there for 
ten francs a day or a more modest French one for 
seven or eight and engage a "guide" to chaperon 
her on her wanderings in the markets and bazaars 
for a small sum. 

The same thing is true of Algiers and Tunis. 
Most north African hotels have a corps of native 
guides, one of whom can be hired for something like 
three to five francs a day and who for the time being 
will be yours to command. While by no means a 
necessity, such a guide will be invaluable as a cicerone 
and in preventing the natives from annoying one. 

The Englishwoman first made Continental Europe 
acquainted with the lone woman traveller. There are 
so many Englishwomen with small incomes that one 
meets them alone and unattached all over Europe, 



154 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

She is in quite a different class from the restless- 
minded American who no sooner gets into a place 
than she wants to know " what there is to do." This 
phase does not bother the Englishwoman. To tell 
the truth, she has a clearer idea of what it is that she 
wants. She is either sketching in water colours, learn- 
ing a language or busy occupying herself by studying 
the people, their literature or their mode of life. 



TI<PS and TI<P<PING 




STUMBLING-BLOCK OF THE TIP 

THE TIP A MENACE TO TRAVEL 

A WORD OF PRAISE FOR THE TIP 

TIPPING NOT AN EXACT SCIENCE 

STEAMER TIPS 

POOLING THE TIPS 

" TEN PER CENT " PLAN 

MEDIUM-PRICED TIPS 

SUBTLE ENGLISH " THANK YOU " 

MINOR TIPS 

THE " POURBOIRE " IN THE SMALL FRENCH HOTEL 

WHEN THE GERMAN SOUNDS THE GONG 

CALCULATING SWISS 

TIPS AT THE AVERAGE TOURIST HOTEL 

GOLD-BRAIDED BRIGADE OF THE GRAND HOTEL 

THE TIPPING-LINE 

TIPPING SYSTEM OF THE PALACE HOTEL 

" TEN PER CENT OF THE BILL " DON'T ALWAYS GO 

THIRTY-THREE AND ONE-THIRD PER CENT OF THE 

BILL 
THE AUTOMOBILE AND ITS SATELLITES 
NO SYSTEM INFALLIBLE 
A GALLANT AMERICAN MAN 






VI 

TIPS AND TIPPING 

Next to the handicap of the language in a foreign 
country comes the stumbling-block of the tip. These 
two things take the bloom off the pleasure of travel 
more than anything else. The TIP (it might as 
well be put in capitals since it is so important) has 
pushed itself entirely too far forward in the scheme 
of European travel; it menaces one from all sides, 
not so much from its size as from its frequency. It 
is not that the right-minded traveller seeks to shirk 
responsibility and thus worries over the thing unduly, 
but rather it is that one is inflicted with a sort of 
nervous strain in the effort to do the right thing. 

The unknowing are never sure that the tip is not 
waiting in ambush to spring upon one unawares. 
To many tired brains surcharged with dates, new 
impressions and new experiences it comes as a last 
burden, and often, not having the strength to reason 
it out logically, one follows that line of the least re- 
sistance which spells demoralisation and succumbs 
forthwith. 

The tip has been so often blamed that it is not 
amiss to give it a word of praise. In its inception 
it was not altogether a bad thing, but formed a 
part of the legitimate price one expected to pay for 
a pleasurable emotion, a service cheerfully and will- 

157 



158 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

ingly rendered, or a good dinner well served. What 
more natural that your contentment should overflow 
and that you should reward the one who had been 
the humble instrument which made these things pos- 
sible. In those times the tip was appreciated, was 
gratefully received, even warmly, and a cordial re- 
lationship was established that left a genial glow on 
both sides. It was the personal expression of one's 
satisfaction and was so looked upon by giver and 
receiver. After all, we buy so much in our journey 
through this world, why not buy a little politeness? 

From being a spontaneous expression of gratitude 
the tip has since become a classified demand of the 
" stand and deliver " order and must be considered 
from a purely dispassionate business viewpoint. 

Unfortunately tipping is not an exact science; if 
one could regulate it as they do the food and drink 
problem the question would be simply one of finance, 
but when the personal equation enters, one risks 
going adrift on an unknown sea. Everything de- 
pends upon time and place, the services rendered and 
that frequently unknown quantity, the custom of the 
country. Nothing marks the seasoned traveller, or 
betrays the novice, so much as the manner of tip- 
ping. To give too much is as bad as to give too 
little. 

There are many formulae but, like most of the 
delicate points of conduct, the correct solution de- 
pends largely upon the individual. Specific advice is 
difficult to give and no set of rules can cover all 
eventualities. 



TIPS AND TIPPING 159 

Women travellers are supposed to be less lav- 
ish with the pourboire than men, and this with 
truth. Woman's instinct is more frugal and she has 
the moral courage not to tip to impress the waiter, 
a point of contact where the lack of nerve in mere 
man causes him to sometimes suffer. Her instincts 
are to deal fairly on a just, if close, margin of ex- 
penditure, until, in a harassed moment, she shuts 
her lips tightly and declares she won't give another 
cent. Man in such a crisis weakens and empties his 
pockets. Each instance shows a lack of dignity. 

The tip bogey catches the traveller in its grip 
from the moment foot is set on shipboard. About 
the fourth day out the confidentially whispered query 
begins to circulate : " How much do you think one 
ought to give, etc. ? " Each hopes to gain strength 
from a knowledge of the views of neighbours. The 
captain not infrequently has the question propounded 
to him, thus adding to the long list of problems to 
solve with which he is already perplexed. Always 
gallant, a ship's captain will usually side with the 
ladies, and may even give them an intimation that 
tips are pooled anyway. Blessed solution! This 
only means handing over a lump sum to the chief 
steward and receiving his lordly thanks. This plan 
has worked, and apparently well, under some cir- 
cumstances, but it is by no means a universal practice. 
It is certainly a less complicated procedure than being 
obliged to apportion the sum of one's fees with dis- 
crimination and has much in its favour. 

There is of course a natural and well-recognised 



160 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

feeling that if some special service has been well 
rendered that one should personally hand over the 
emolument therefor. But the embarrassing ques- 
tion of " How much " automatically imposes itself. 

For the traveller of modest means, with the aver- 
age duration of the period of sea-sickness — one to 
two days — and who makes the average demands 
upon the patience and services of the ship's servants, 
ten dollars should be an ample tax, and one which 
will allow her to leave even the most luxurious and 
fashionable of the modern flyers without embarrass- 
ment. The thing can be cut twenty-five per cent, or 
even one-third, but there is a tendency, as the prices 
of steamship passages advance, for the ratio of the 
proportion of tips to advance also. 

On this basis some such apportioning of the sum 
as follows should fill the bill : Two dollars and a half 
to the table steward; the same to the stewardess; a 
dollar, or a dollar and a half, to the deck stewards 
who dispense broth and tea and toast and keep your 
deck chair and steamer rugs ready at hand; another 
dollar, or half as much again, would go to the in- 
dividual who prepares your morning bath, if indeed 
this did not happen to be your stewardess. Then 
there is the " boots " for a trifle, and the library 
steward who hands out the latest novels for you to 
read, and finally the subscription for the band. On 
such a basis of reckoning, ten dollars is thus readily 
absorbed. Recently a new phase of the question 
has opened up. On one of the largest, though not 
the fastest of North Atlantic steamships a subscrip- 



TIPS AND TIPPING 



ibi 



tion was taken up for the cooks. Another tax, but 
was it not a deserving one? 

Since ladies are now beginning to make use of the 
smoking-rooms, on the big Mediterranean-bound 
steamships in particular, one wonders if they ought 
not to contribute something in that direction also. 
There is the gymnasium, too, which certainly ought 
to be paid for if used, though it is down in the line's 
advertisements as free. 

If one occupies a de luxe suite on the upper prome- 
nade deck and takes his, or her, meals in private, 
naturally the tips take on more or less the com- 
plexion of the surroundings of the giver. If five 
hundred dollars is paid for a crossing, a fifty-dollar 
tip is not disproportionate. 

Again, if constant attention is required by the or- 
dinarily modest travellers, meals served on deck at 
all hours, special dishes and special services all along 
the line, why, as for all such transactions, a readjust- 
ment of the scale must be made. With a little judi- 
cious care and forethought steamer tips can be easily 
kept down to their proper proportion, and it should 
be the duty of the conscientious traveller to see that 
they are. 

Immediately one lands, a new set of troubles be- 
gin. Herr Baedeker's useful little red books indorse 
the " ten per cent plan," the tips amounting to ten 
per cent of the charge. Tips more often stand or 
fall on their own merits, their relation to the volume 
of service rendered rather than to the cost thereof. 
For a short stay the ten per cent plan may really 



162 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

prove economical, but for a protracted sojourn the 
reverse may be the case. Tips for a week, for in- 
stance, ought not, in the majority of cases, to be 
greatly in excess of those for three days, certainly 
not a hundred per cent more. Actually among the 
knowing the ratio is a diminishing one, which is 
logical. 

Certain hotels have officially recognised this ten 
per cent plan and mark you down on the bill for 
ten per cent of its total for service. This is a 
retrograde movement, however, whatever its appar- 
ent advantages may be for the timid. One's brain 
is not racked with arithmetic, but the service deteri- 
orates, inexplicably perhaps, but manifestly. What 
is everybody's business is apt to be neglected by all, 
and the personal incentive for a waiter to see that 
you are served with an extra fork at the desired 
moment is lacking. 

The unit in France, Belgium, Italy and Spain being 
what corresponds to the franc (which is not twenty 
cents do not forget : the United States government in 
all its operations reckons it at but $.193), as against 
the shilling in England, a mark in Germany (which 
are valued at about twenty-five cents each) and little 
Holland's expensive florin at nearly forty cents, tip- 
ping in these twenty-cent countries comes a little less 
than at home where one so lavishly expends quarters. 
Replace these larger coins with that which is nearest 
our own dime and you will well solve the problem 
of the medium-priced tip abroad. Manipulated with 
just the right legerdemain the coin will work won- 



TIPS AND TIPPING 163 

ders and keep the bigger silver pieces, as the French 
have it, from rolling down hill too fast. 

In England the little silver sixpence will unlock 
most doors, though one will often be amazed as to 
the class of people who will accept this insignificant 
talisman. Black silk-gowned housekeepers of earls' 
mansions, and the palms of stately, plush-garbed 
footmen and butlers will readily close over it, and 
people with top hats and frock coats will respond 
with an unctious " thank you " as readily as if you 
had handed them a dollar. Remember you must, 
however, that every one above the rank of a working 
man in England wears a frock coat, often your 
butcher who cuts you off your chops and steaks; it 
amounts almost to a livery of non-conformist re- 
spectability. 

Oh! that subtle English "thank you"; how it 
can be made to run the gamut of politeness. It 
can be made to express every shade from servility 
to insolence. Note its gradations and you will thus 
be able to judge how nearly right was your tip. 
It is the most hard-worked expression in the English 
language. One likes it when first coming over from 
" thankless " America, but the later mechanical repe- 
titions get very much on the nerves, especially when 
the servants degenerate into the practice of thanking 
themselves, which is practically what it amounts to 
when they serve you to the accompaniment of a 
11 thank you " from their own lips. 

One should study the minor tips in all their phases 
if there is a desire to be respected. In England give 



1 64 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

a tu'pence only to the railway porter when he carries 
your rug and bag from the cab to your seat in the 
railway carriage; then he will think you are on 
speaking terms, at least, with the nobility. If there 
is also a trunk to be weighed and looked after, labelled 
and put in the " van," a sixpence will keep him from 
suspecting that you are one of those spendthrift 
people from " the States." 

The auto-taxi has largely done away with the 
widely speculative feature of one's dealing with an 




unprincipled cabby of other days, though the ques- 
tion still remains to be wrestled with. Here again 
it is, or should be, the tu'pence, or, in taking a ride 
with an English friend, you may find that he pays 
only the registered fare. 

The skidding hansom is still in evidence in Lon- 
don's streets, but the taxi has reduced its fare to 
sixpence a mile. In some ways it still remains a 
typical mode of conveyance, the etiquette of which 
is that if you have a male companion the doors 



TIPS AND TIPPING 165 

must remain open. There is no such unwritten law 
for the taxi. 

Five sous, twenty-five centimes, five cents should 
be the minor tip elsewhere in Europe, perhaps ten 
or twenty pfennigs in Germany or twenty Dutch 
cents. Such a schedule or rate of payment can usu- 
ally be applied to the minor services asked for, or 
offered en route, and in most cases will be accepted 
graciously. In Belgium even the street-car conduc- 
tors are not averse to accepting even the odd sou. 
In England one is expected to give the postman a 
tip if his services have been made use of for any 
but the briefest of periods. This charge if met at 
all calls for a shilling, though the usual tourist will 
not often stay long enough in any one place to come 
under this reckoning. In France about the same 
state of affairs exists, unless one stays in a pension 
or hotel, where the porter, concierge or clerk serves 
as a buffer. 

The small European hotel has many advantages 
over the great caravanseries, and not the least of 
these is the freedom from the obligation, real or 
implied, of superfluous tipping. The staff is smaller 
to begin with, and its duties are distinctly defined. 
In the English inn there will be a mutton-chop-whis- 
kered waiter in the coffee-room, in other words, the 
dining-room, and a white-capped maid upstairs, with 
a small "boots" somewhere in the background. 
These are to be remembered, but there are no others. 
Two shillings and sixpence, half a crown, ought to 
cover all services rendered for a twenty-four hour 



1 66 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

stay, and even if there are two maids this should 
not alter the tip's total. For taking the baggage to 
and from the station a supplementary tu'pence, or 
even sixpence, can be added to the former sum with- 
out a loss of self-respect or a feeling that it may be 
misunderstood. 

In the French country hotel one deals with an 
obliging bonne more often than with a gargon, and 
there will be no " boots " in the English sense. Your 
shoes will be looked after all the same, and for the 
service you can increase the bonne's tip for cleaning 
them and she will be all the more grateful. If you 
dispense a couple of francs of largesse for a thirty- 
six hours' stay every one will feel that they have been 
well paid and four or five francs for a week will 
prove a figure to command respect. It it quite un- 
called for that one should remember the chef in the 
French country inn, though you may see him often 
enough in cook's cap and apron hanging ingratiat- 
ingly around. More often than not, in spite of the 
garb, it will be the proprietor himself, and he doesn't 
make his money that way, so don't commit a faux 
pas. In the purely country hotels of Italy one gets 
off as easily as in France. Two servants run the 
establishment as a rule and their scale of expectations 
does not strike a very high note. 

In Germany the feeling is that the small hotel 
away from the large centres is given to exploiting 
the stranger on all hands. Evidently the tourist is 
looked upon as an idle, wandering person of a certain 
tangible wealth from which he has a desire to be 



TIPS AND TIPPING 167 

parted. Perhaps, in many cases, this is a logical 
point of view after all. Especially may the woman 
traveller notice this. The Germans have a saying: 
" The man and the dog can go out, but the woman 
and the cat must stay in." The Germans are re- 
sponsible for the ingenious plan of sounding a gong 
to warn the servants of the departure of a guest 
that the " line up " may not be found wanting. A 
suspicion that there is a " pooling " of interests is 
certainly justified here. 

The Swiss is the most calculating person that ever 
held out an itching palm for a pourboire, and yet he 
is not as insistent as the Parisian Frenchman, nor as 
vociferous as the Italian of the Tuscan towns beloved 
of tourists. It is simply that he is ever ready and 
on the spot, looking hard for whatever may be com- 
ing to him. He is rarely demonstratively grateful, 
and his thanks are invariably perfunctory, but always 
he does his duty towards the traveller according to 
his creed, which has made him the greatest nation of 
hotel keepers extant. The traveller he regards as 
he does the rain sent from heaven, the manna fallen 
from the trees, and his chief joy is to push one of 
these money spenders into more confined quarters 
in order that he may double up another couple where 
only a single person lodged before. As for the per- 
sonnel of the class that lives on tips they expect 
always that the present prey will be found more 
juicy than the last, and, again, if he falls short of 
his expectations with you he can be depended upon to 
take it out of the next comer. His is like any other 



1 68 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

business and his chief aim is to have the balance as 
far over on the right side of the profit and loss 
account as possible. At the small Swiss hotel one 
can make an admirable showing with a franc tip 
properly bestowed, but it must be done with the air 
of being to the manner born. Two francs a day per 
head, judiciously divided and bestowed, will accom- 
plish a great deal even in the great palace hotels of 
the resorts. The Swiss have a college which fits the 
youth of the land for the business of hotel keeping; 
whether it has a chair of tipping or not the writer 
does not know. 

The European hotel, whether it be great or small, 
that caters for the tourist exclusively is the best ex- 
ponent of the successful tip system of graft. Here 
the tippees are an organised body, and even in the 
more modest establishments each one's service is so 
attenuated that the greatest possible return is assured 
the combination. Your bill may have been a modest 
enough one to begin with ; eight, ten or twelve lire 
a day perhaps, or as many francs, but should you 
have been in the house for but a period of twenty-four 
hours this is about what the staff would work out 
in their own minds as being their due. 



Dining-room waiter, or the 






maitre d'hotel, or both . 


i 


franc 


Chambermaid 


i 


»» 


Hall porter .... 


i 


»> 


Boy, or man, who brings bag- 






gage from room 




50 centimes 



TIPS AND TIPPING 169 

Man who loads baggage on 

bus 50 centimes 

Bus driver who helps with 

baggage at station . . 1 franc 

Making quite a respectable 

total of . . .5 francs 

This may virtually amount to but half your origi- 
nal bill, and is of course far too great a proportion. 
It is easy to see that the ten per cent plan is out of 
business here. Try and distribute a single franc, 
taking an average bill of ten francs as a basis, among 
six persons and see what would happen. Of course 
for two this might well be cut down to three francs, 
or perhaps even two francs, fifty centimes each when 
the proportions come a little nearer what they ought 
really to be, but even then they are in the neighbour- 
hood of the twenty-five per cent mark. To all in- 
tents and purposes this is what happens in any French, 
Swiss or Italian hotel which lives exclusively off a 
tourist clientele. The axiom that the slower one 
travels the cheaper it becomes, applies as well to 
tipping. For a stay of several days, where one gives 
five lire for oneself alone, seven or seven and a half 
would cover it for two, and for a week's sojourn, ten 
lire would add as much to the hotel servant's seeming 
happiness as a larger sum. Where travellers make 
one-night stands the tippee scores. 

The scale ascends rapidly to the " grand " and the 

palace " hotels. It is here that the brigand of old 

has risen to the new conditions and disguised himself 



170 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

under a gold-buttoned and gold-laced uniform and 
becomes a minion of a great tourist caravansary. 
Here he finds business quite as profitable and less 
dangerous, and here, too, vanishes the last vestige 
of the old-time relation between the giver and re- 
ceiver, the guest and the servant. 

Here the gold-braided brigade is everlastingly at 
one's heels, giving one the feeling of being in an 
asylum looked after by an only too attentive staff 




HALL PORTER H£AD WAITER. 



WAITER 



CHAMBER /v\/9ID 



of care-takers. Doors fly open before one and chairs 
fly from under, one is bowed through corridors and 
up staircases as only were the kings of old. Then 
monarchs made their subjects pay for the privilege, 
but to-day it is the subject who wins. All these 
menials speak the American language, at least to 
the extent of " good-morning," for they know how 
the American loves the sound of his native tongue, 
even though doled out in limited quantities. 

As you walk down the line of expectant mortals on 



TIPS AND TIPPING 



171 



the day of departure and dispense commercial solace, 
figuring up value given and received, you see why 
the ten per cent plan does not always work. 

At many a " palace " hotel, even, one can live 
for twenty or twenty-five francs a day, with another 
ten francs to cover wine and mineral waters and other 
incidentals. This works out six to seven dollars a day 
and may be considered good value for the money 
paid. These tips at these great tourist hotels, for 



The TIPPING 
m LINE 




VALET UeCHflm&RE PORTER. 



BOOTS" "BUTTONS Etc- 



thirty-six hours, would work out something as fol- 
lows, provided one could not resist the " come on " 
look in the hungry eyes of the staff, otherwise they 
might be somewhat discounted. 



Door porter .... 


2 francs 


Maitre d'hotel 


2 " 


Sommelier (waiter who serves 




your cafe-au-lait) 


1 " 


Bath attendant 


1 " 



172 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

Femme-de-Chambre . . 2 francs 
Porter who brings up your 

bags 

Porter who brings them down 
Porter who brings up trunks 
Porter who brings them down 
Nondescript individual who 

blackens your boots . . 50 

Porter who assists you with 

luggage at station . . 1 







50 centimes 






50 


I 


II 




I 


>> 





12 francs 50 centimes 

And this again is nearer thirty-three and one-third 
per cent of the bill than ten per cent, which latter 
proportion, three francs, fifty centimes, would not go 
far among the expectant horde. One solution would 
be to stay on a while and run up your bill to ten or 
fifteen times its original amount, when again the ten 
per cent basis would overpay these grafters. Like 
the " systems " at Monte Carlo's Casino, no scheme 
of tipping of the preconceived order can be made to 
work both ways — the zero of uncertainty is always 
against the player. 

No automobile tips have been included in the 
above schedule. The question may be asked: has 
the automobile increased the size of the tip? It has 
introduced an entirely new conglomeration of satel- 
lites into the planetary sphere of servantdom. What, 
then, are their demands? In the small foreign 
hotel the stable boy, hostler or garqon d'ecurie has 






TIPS AND TIPPING 173 

the big touring car under his charge instead of the 
chahes-de-poste and the berlins-de-zoyage of other 
days. He runs around the corner to the grocer's 
for gasolene, or oil, fills up the water tank, and will 
lend a useful and willing hand wherever wanted. 
This service may usually be considered worth a franc, 
but can often be had, with an acceptant smile thrown 
in, for half that sum. 

In a big hotel garage, like that of the Hotel 
Univers at Tours, in the Chateaux country, the man 
who fills up your gasolene tank can readily absorb a 
franc without a quaver, while the young fellow who 
ostentatiously attempts to rub the varnish off your 
mud-guard or the lustre off your leather cushions will 
eye you expectantly for fifty centimes at least. If 
your chauffeur hands out this thirty sous himself, it 
will likely be increased one hundred per cent before 
you pay the bill. This is not much, according to 
the American scale, for often enough the lodging for 
your automobile has been thrown in free, but all the 
same, on a hundred days' tour, it is a round fifty 
dollars thrown away for service that ought to be 
included in the price one pays. 

One gallant American, on his first trip abroad, 
with a party of ladies, decided that he would not 
annoy or inflict them with the small matter of tips. 
He began by paying them out of his own pocket, 
but after a week or two of these heart-breaking dis- 
bursements he finally suggested to the rest of the 
party that a common fund be opened for such dis- 
bursements, of which he was to be the cashier. And 



174 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

this, by the way, is not a bad method of collectively 
handling the tip question by all who travel in droves. 

Take heed from the foreigner, especially the Ger- 
man, and get what hints you can. The Teuton, at 
least, is not always seen with his hands in his pockets 
about to bring forth a glitter of small coin, and yet 
he fares as well as the stranger from over-seas, 
whether from over the Channel or across the Atlantic. 

Two sous will accomplish for the German on the 
Riviera what ten will do for most of the rest of us, 
and there will be no noticeable difference in the 
quality of the service. Well he knows the secret! 
It comes from familiarity with the situation. The 
solution of the problem is to go often enough. The 
" personally conducted " tour that can guarantee a 
tipless itinerary of Europe has a financial future 
ahead of it. 

If the automobile is responsible for the rise in 
the scale of tips, to what heights will they not soar 
when the aeroplane becomes the preferred mode of 
conveyance. Then there will be a man to push you 
out of a hangar and give you a shove off, or there 
will be a whole army holding on to the guy-ropes 
of your dirigible, and all these will have to be paid. 
There is no limit to the possibilities of the profession 
which lives off of tips. 

One thing that will help is to keep yourself sup- 
plied with small coin ; then a mere ripple made in the 
reverse direction will sometimes keep down the in- 
coming wave. 

The English started this abominable custom on 



TIPS AND TIPPING 175 

the Continent on the same lines as they had run 
things in their own country, but the American came 
after and noisily, recklessly and lavishly cast them 
into the shade. 

Anglo-Saxons tip, it must be confessed, to show 
the foreigner they at least think that they are of 
a superior race. This is how it looks to the Con- 
tinental European, though more often it is really 
because they are on a holiday jaunt and, like all 
holiday-makers who are fully in the spirit of the 
thing, they want everybody around them to partici- 
pate in their good humour, so it is they scatter 
a golden shower, unmindful that they are sowing 
a crop of dragon's teeth which will ultimately spring 
up an armed force to demand by right what was 
originally given by favour. 



EUROPEAN S3 (sa S3 
^ SHOPPING TOUR 



Caisse j 



THE HUNDRED-DOLLAR LIMIT 
DENATIONALISATION OF FOREIGN GOODS 
THE AMERICAN WOMAN RAISES PRICES 
INITIATING EUROPE TO " SHOPPING " VERSUS 
" BUYING " 

english and french clerks 

policy of some london shops 

london tailor-made 

harris tweeds and irish homespuns 

laces and linens of the emerald isle 

scottish plaids for any clan 

paris a city of small shops 

where the frenchwoman scores 

woman shopkeepers of paris 

paris artist-milliners 

department stores of paris 

" bon marche " 

professional shoppers 

staff of a great paris department store 

brussels lace 

diamonds of amsterdam and the rue de la paix 

dutch silver 

swiss embroidery 

Berlin's palatial department stores 



VII 
THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 

THE BRITISH ISLES 

A shopping tour of Europe to-day might be defined 
as a stroll through that portion of New York City 
which lies between Twenty-third and Forty-second 
Streets, where most of the luxuries, and not a little 
of the junk of foreign manufacturers is to be found 
within a radius of one square mile. 

There is no doubt but that the enterprise of the 
American importer, combined with the stringent 
application of the hundred-dollar clause, has damp- 
ened the craze of the American woman for shopping 
around Europe. At last even the most unmethodical 
and unbusinesslike woman has been broken in to 
filling out the customs declaration with a fairly cor- 
rect statement of her purchases abroad, though they 
are apt to lose their charm and ofttimes their value 
under the cold, impartial scrutiny of the government 
appraiser, for she often wonders, when she repacks 
her trunks on a draughty New York steamship pier, 
if the pleasure of possession was worth the sum of 
the duty paid. 

As a preface to a shopping chapter, it may not 
be amiss to reiterate the definition of the hundred- 
dollar limit. It must be composed of wearing ap- 

179 



180 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

parel, or articles for personal use, and may not in- 
clude household furnishings or anything not related 
to the immediate wardrobe and toilet of the indi- 
vidual who accompanies them. Having got this 
fact firmly grounded in one's mind it only remains 
to remember that the average duties levied are about 
thirty per cent, while perhaps certain articles that 
most attract the woman shopper pay only fifty per 
cent. This represents the highest handicap duty. 
That on art is no approach compared to that levied 
on feminine adornments, such as feathers, laces and 
jewelry. As for smuggling by the amateur, it is 
as dead as a prehistoric mastadon encased in an 
arctic ice drift. From a professional point of view 
it is quite another matter. 

The charm of discovering new fields in which to 
shop, of bargaining in the rudiments of a foreign 
language, can never be eradicated by any law or 
custom, and will remain one of the pleasant antici- 
pations of that episode in the life of so many Amer- 
ican women which is becoming almost a yearly neces- 
sity — a trip abroad. 

But this picking out of bargains is a shattered 
dream so far as the tourist's rush of two or three 
months about Europe is concerned. It is for just 
her class that the European shopkeeper is catering, 
knowing that she has not the time, nor opportunity, 
for discriminating in values. He arranges specious 
"bargains" and fixes prices on a scale that leaves 
him a wide margin from which to drop and still 
make a fat profit. 



THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 181 

Everywhere the manufacturers and merchants 
alike are making their output conform to the taste and 
demand of the best class of buyers — the American 
women. The result is that the distinctly foreign 
article is looking less like a novelty and more reminis- 
cent of what she sees at home. Thus arises a vague 
discontent on the part of the shopper who does not 
realise that she is spoiling the genuineness of the 
European shopping ground, and incidentally her own 
pleasure, in insisting upon American standards — 
which the shopkeeper takes to mean American prices 
as well. This dazzle of the dollars is blinding him 
not a little in his summing up of the foreign woman. 
Souvenir buying, too, is often carried on injudiciously. 
A riff-raff of plunder collected from all corners of 
Europe, none of it in its place of origin, is apt to 
lose considerably in importance and value when these 
reconsidered trifles are opened up at home. It may 
be permissible enough to buy a Swiss watch in 
Geneva — if one really wants one — but coral and tor- 
toise shell, remember, are not specialties of Paris any 
more than they are of Vienna, nor are all so-called 
Swiss hand-embroideries the real thing. 

Shopping is quite a personal affair, and small 
courtesies, by which doing business is made easier, 
are expected. Particularly is this so if one falls in 
with the Continental habit of bowing on entering or 
leaving the small shop, doubly so in the Latin coun- 
tries. It is often the lack of these little observations 
of courtesy that so handicap the stranger in dealing 
with the " natives " of a foreign land. 



i82 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

The shopkeeper abroad has been forced to recog- 
nise the distinction that the American woman makes 
between " shopping " and " buying." It went hardly 
against his prejudices and traditions to spread out 
a counter full of goods without making a sale, and 
he fought against the innovation, but too much money 
was involved, and to the credit of the American 
woman belongs the victory of being able to walk 
about the big department stores of Paris and Berlin, 
without being shadowed by an insistent clerk, with 




the same freedom as at Macy's, Wanamaker's or 
Marshall Field's. 

This is not the case in England. The mind of 
the English clerk is still set in motion by old-fashioned 
clock work. He is obliging enough in pulling down 
goods for inspection, and " thanks you " every time 
you ask him a question or answers one himself, but 
he does not thank you if you don't buy; and when 
you understand the system you don't wonder at his 
insistence, even forgive it. Each time a customer 
gets away without his making a sale he is reprimanded 
by the " shop-walker," who puts a black mark against 



THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 183 

his name. Let him get too many of the damning 
marks and he loses his job, and losing a job in Eng- 
land often means not getting another. This is still 
the policy in many London shops. 

The demeanour of the French shop clerk is almost 
a relief by contrast. Lie demands that you state 
explicitly just what you want before he will take 
down one thing, nor does he assume the responsibil- 
ity of clarifying the customer's mind by suggestions. 
It may be good training for the shopper, but makes 
for difficulties, especially as the habit of featuring 
new goods where they can be seen does not always 
hold. 

The small shopkeeper throughout Europe still re- 
sents, however, the nosing around of the inquiring 
American woman with no intention of buying. The 
polite manner soon freezes up and the innocent 
offender is followed by uncomplimentary mutter- 
ings and impertinent tosses of the head when she 
leaves. 

On a par with this is the custom of having the 
woman clerks " live in," a relic of the old apprentice 
system when the articled clerk lived under his mas- 
ter's roof as one of the family, but it assumes a dif- 
ferent aspect when it comes to housing in the attic 
dormitory of a great shop. This is a dreary ex- 
istence for one who has toiled all day to the ultimate 
Benefit of the masters, who make a profit in addition 
on meagre rooms and meals. The policy that gov- 
erns sales makes for another exasperating habit of 
the English clerk, who, when you seek to buy a 



184 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

yard of ribbon, insists that you buy a coal-scuttle as 
well, and reels glibly off his tongue a list of the 
entire stock in hope that it may suggest something 
to your mind. The English rather like this habit 
of having their minds made up for them; it saves 
them the trouble of making out a shopping list. 

" No lady would think of buying a ready-made 
dress," the London tailor used to say, with a shocked 
accent on the lady, but that has changed now. There 
is a high-class trade in ready-made suits, largely made 
by the rush of Americans to London at certain sea- 
sons. Formerly, the Englishwoman would have 
considered herself on a par with the servant girl 
(and not so long ago, either) by wearing a ready- 
made gown, but since it is now being confectioned 
on such good lines and sold at such high prices 
it pleases the most fastidious. 

If the London tailor is even given the slightest 
time allowance, however, he will rise to an astonish- 
ing rate of speed and turn out a suit " to measure," 
as they say. It is not always of the fastidious finish 
demanded by the American, but the price will be a 
third cheaper than at home and made of a cloth that 
for a tailor-made cannot be duplicated. Harris 
tweeds, which were hand woven by the crofter in his 
" lone shieling in that misty isle," around the peat 
fire, used to have this same peaty smell for a trade- 
mark. Now the manufacturers have been clever 
enough to imitate the smell along with the cloth. 
The tweeds and the soft-coloured Irish homespuns 
from the handlooms of the Emerald Isle, are the 



THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 185 

two fabrics of which the British isles may well be 
proud. 

In spite of the obsequiousness of the London shop- 
keeper and seeming desire to accommodate, one will 
be asked not to come for a fitting between four and 
five as " our fitter, Mr. Jenkins, will be out for his 
tea." This is a dead hour for business in England; 
go through the busiest offices, and desks will be seen 
littered over with plum cake and teacups; or get 
into a private office by mistake, and a party of clerks 
will be gathered cosily around a tea-table. The late 
hour of closing — seven to eight o'clock — is responsi- 
ble in a measure for this. 

Prices in the best London shops are in guineas, the 
pound plus a shilling. The coin does not exist, but 
the extra shilling makes a " gentleman's " price, es- 
pecially designed and kept alive for the aristocracy 
and Americans. One advantage for the latter is 
that it is nearer the value of five dollars than the 
plebeian pound. 

Irish linen, contrary to what is usually the case, 
can really be bought often to better advantage in its 
home town, Belfast, than anywhere else, and it's 
worth while taking what is always an uncomfortable 
voyage across the Irish Channel if only to lay in one's 
stock of linen and Irish laces with the assistance of 
the pleasant Irish salesmen, full of Blarney, even 
though he is a long ways away from the Blarney- 
stone. It is preferable to shopping for the same thing 
in London with the cold, mechanical London clerk 
reeling off " thank yous " as fast as he does the lace. 



186 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

In this case one can visit the cottages about Dublin, 
for much of the lace is still made by the cottagers 
at home, who are always delighted to see any Amer- 
icans, whom they really regard more as blood rela- 
tions than their cousins across the Channel. Of 
course it is amusing to buy some lace as a souvenir 
from a cottager, but, like everything else, it is well 
to deal with the big establishments. Certain pat- 
terns will be made specially for the buyer, and mono- 
grams can always be furnished on short notice, and 
at wonderfully reasonable rates. Of course there 
are shops in London devoted to the Irish industries 
that do an enormous business, largely with the 
Americans, but it is rather curious to the outsider, 
who still calls the British Isles England, to find how 
much jealousy there is in England regarding the 
Irish products. The beautiful Irish silk poplins are 
kept in stock by all the big London houses because 
they have to, but they really often require digging 
out, and persistence, in order to convince the clerk 
that you will have the real Irish poplin, not any 
corded silk of doubtful make. You will sometimes 
even be told that they will be obliged to send to 
Ireland for it, unless you have been forewarned, and 
can produce a sample of the very thing you want 
that had come from this very shop. No wonder 
the Irish want Home Rule! 

Only sentiment can beautify the Scotch plaid, but 
one can always find a plaid to suit's one's clan, and 
a clan to suit one's taste, if they only look for it 
across the border. Your Scotch friend will tell you 



THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 187 

that nobody but Americans shop on Princes Street; 
the canny Scot knows where to find prices less ele- 
vated. If you want a plaid, — and there is nothing 
better for the steamer rug after all, — it is best to 
deal directly with the manufacturer, who gets out 
an excellent catalogue showing the plaids of all the 
clans in colour. It is possible in this way to make a 
choice and have your purchase sent on to meet you 
at any point if you do not wish to investigate the 
matter further yourself. 

FRANCE 

In spite of its grands magazins, and they are 
growing grander and more numerous every day, 
Paris is a city of small shops. The French are per- 
sonal and distinctive in all their business relations, 
and this is probably the reason why they still cling 
to the small shop and the small hotel. The shop- 
keeper wants to do just enough business and keep 
at it long enough to be able to retire as a rentier 
before he arrives at too advanced an age, and live in 
a tiny suburban villa not too far away from Paris. 
Nothing could be more distasteful to him than to 
be obliged to increase his business at the expense of 
more trouble and work. 

The French shopper wants to deal where things 
are not so rushed but that she can talk confidentially 
over her prospective purchases, take her time and 
thus be able to feel that she has done a little suc- 
cessful bargaining. 



188 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

Ask the Frenchwoman about the " Bon Marche " 
and the other big Paris shops that the American 
tourists so dearly love, under the impression that 
they are getting things " oh, so cheap! " and she will 
say how dear they are, because she has some little 
shop around the corner at which she can get real 
bargains. But the stranger cannot get the same 
prices that she does. That is why the big Paris 
department stores — with their fixed prices — are much 
safer and more satisfactory shopping ground for the 
stranger. Prices in the small shop, not only of Paris 
but of all Europe, are as variable as the barometer, 
on which the appearance of the American buyer acts 
like an area of high pressure. 

The small shop that specialises is the feature of 
Paris shopping. One goes to a trunk shop to buy a 
trunk, a corset shop for corsets, a glove place for 
gloves or a shop that deals entirely in lingerie, where 
any special embroidery will be done the customer 
may desire. 

These are the places where real bargains can be 
got, but they are found only on the side streets, in 
unpretentious courts, sometimes up a flight of stairs 
— not on the grand boulevards. "Ma cherie, you 
are crazy to pay boulevard prices," says your French 
friend; " the same thing costs double there." But a 
knowledge of French and the Frenchwoman is neces- 
sary to shop to advantage in the small shop all the 
same. 

It is the Frenchwoman who is the small Paris 
shopkeeper. What genius the nation has for selling, 



THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 189 

which is not much (the French are not by instinct 
commercial), centres in the women. The Parisian 
shopkeeper, neatly dressed, not a hair of her coiffure 
out of place, sits behind the counter, knitting lace 
or doing fancy work. Beside her, on the counter as 
likely, sleeps a fluffy cat — a peaceful picture. Ma- 
dame is polite, but not too urbane; she has none of 
the servility of the small British shopkeeper. A cal- 
culating gleam comes into her eyes at one's first words 
of French — no matter how good. There will prob- 
ably be the sign, " English spoken," outside, but this 
means nothing very often but the ability to say 
" good-morning " and " good-bye," and is only put on 
as a bait. Madame prefers that her customer should 
be hampered by language rather than herself. It is 
not to the real advantage of the European shop- 
keeper to know how to speak English, though they 
often understand a good deal, which is well for cus- 
tomers to remember when discussing pros and cons 
among themselves. In dealing with madame one 
must have a fairly good knowledge of values to hold 
up one's end in the encounter of wits. 

The most satisfactory of the small shops is that 
of the modiste, and one that it is almost a necessity 
for the stranger shopper to patronise, as the millinery 
departments of the department shops are one of their 
least satisfactory features. Just a plain milliner may 
exist anywhere, but the modiste is a product of Paris. 
She is not merely a craftswoman; she is an artist, 
with an artist's understanding of colour and of form. 
A hat in her hands is not a thing of measurements 



igo THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

and calculation, but an inspiration, born of the brains 
that rest in her fingers' ends. 

Hers is the most typical of those " delightful little 
shops " to be found at their best not too far away from 
the Rue Royale. Quite often she has gone into the 
business as a " career " impelled, as is the artist, by 
the call of genius. Sometimes she may come of an 
aristocratic family, who hides her origin under the 
patronymic of " Alexandrine," or " Pauline," or 
" Victorine," or some one of those names that only 
suggests the Parisian modiste. 

Often enough in the least commercial neighbour- 
hoods the more modest shops are up two or three 
flights of stairs, and no elevators either. But often 
as good results come out of these upper rooms with 
no show windows to advertise as in the bigger es- 
tablishment on the rez-de-chanssee with the plate- 
glass windows, though it is true that what is to be 
seen in the windows is no criterion of what may 
come out of a French shop. 

To use a British commercial expression, the French 
do not " put their goods in the front window." No 
French shop, be it great or small, will ever show its 
latest modes or most exclusive models in the win- 
dow; not even for the sake of attracting custom will 
the French modiste set out her choicest ideas where 
they may be copied. Americans often criticise the 
styles that they see in their survey of shop windows, 
and are heard to declare that they had seen the new- 
est thing before they left home, but they ignore the 
fact that madame, who presides over the destinies 




When the Native Lady Goes Shopping 
in North Africa 



THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 191 

of the shop, must have full confidence that you are 
really a customer before she will bring out her best. 
She will never learn the open-minded American pol- 
icy of baiting her shop windows with her best. In 
England it is exactly the contrary; the window often 
contains the shop's whole stock, and one who is curi- 
ous may enter and find no greater variety inside. In 
general, it is this lack of a large stock which is a 
puzzling phase of the shopping question abroad for 
the American. 

The Parisian shopkeeper, when she is sure of her 
customer, when she finds that she is not just pricing 
things, can be the most charming of sales persons. 
She has the art of enveloping her customer with a 
personal interest that gives such a charm to the little 
individual shops of Paris. No one can combine tact, 
winning ways and business method so well as the 
vraie Parisienne — when she wishes. 

If you want to find an American in Paris look for 
her, and for him too, in the " Bon Marche," for the 
American man confesses to the usefulness of this 
universal provider. To this internationally known 
establishment is due the credit of having introduced 
the department store and the fixed price into Euro- 
pean commerce, thus simplifying shopping abroad for 
the English-speaking person. Modelling after came 
" The Grand Magazin du Louvre," that draws the 
American as much as the palace itself; the " Prin- 
temps," the " Trois Quartiers," and the " Galleries 
Lafayette " came after, and in all of them the cheer- 



THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

ful American voice can be heard almost as much as 
the French itself. 

The policy of the grm*d g BtN towards its 

foreign clientele is a liberal one. Goods are sent on 
approval in any quantity, and left for a decision for 
so remarkable a length of time that it astonishes the 
buver from overseas, who is also surprised that the 
boy who brings them around wants a tip for having 
done so. 

One can call for an English-speaking clerk, and 
make all purchases under his guidance. " There are 
nearly seventy oi us who speak English." he will tell 
you at the " Bon Marche." " and perhaps a hundred 
and fifty who understand it to some extent." For 
this reason alone one will find it easy enough to 
shop here without any knowledge of the Gallic 
tongue. Everything is plainly tagged with the price, 
but the clerk-guide will save time. The geography 
of these shops is not always the same, as they have 
a confusing way of shifting the position of goods. 
To any one accustomed to the broad spaces and sys- 
tematic arrangements of the American store, these 
big Paris magazines are crowded and uncomfortable 
to shop in. Confusion seems to reign on all sides. 
One has to follow the clerk with one's purchase up 
to the caisse, pay for it there and wait until it is 
wrapped up, which means, sometimes, standing in 
line, and spending more time than was spent on the 
actual buying. Two or three dozen excited women 
gathered about a desk, trying to identify packages 



THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 193 

and make change, has its parallel only in a bargain 
sale at home. 

The " Bon Marche " has the repute of being what 
its name advertises — the best bargains and cheapest 
prices for the quality. The " Louvre " is more ex- 
pensive and perhaps carries a better grade of stock, 
but has not the variety of the " Bon Marche." The 
" Galleries Lafayette " have a reputation for lingerie, 
white goods and silks, while the " Printemps " is on 
much the same order as the " Bon Marche," with 
the " Samarataine " a trifle lower down the scale. 

There is a class of women making a business of 
hanging around these shops and coming to the assist- 
ance of the stranger when mired in the intricacies of 
a foreign language. Their motives are usually of a 
frankly obvious commercial aspect, and one wonders 
that the custom is allowed to exist. The American's 
reputation for free-spending has developed all kinds 
of Parisian parasites. 

The professional shopper is sometimes useful on 
occasions, particularly in Paris, but the pleasure of 
shopping, as in many other things, often lies as much 
in what one discovers for themselves as in the achieve- 
ment of possession. One class of Paris professionals 
can be made very useful. Almost any of the large 
shops will send a professional packer to fill one's 
trunk, with the disorder which usually accompanies 
a more or less prolonged hotel stay. Prices for this 
service are reasonable enough, but the genuine travel- 
ler should learn the art for herself. 

A curious feature of the foreign shops is the side- 



194 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

walk display of their cheaper classes of goods, where 
sales are made by employees, who stand for ten 
or twelve hours a day in all weathers at these side- 
walk counters. They are among the minor em- 
ployees, and get not over forty or fifty francs a 
month. As they rise to the important inside depart- 
ments their ardour and aptitude is spurred on by a 
commission of one to three per cent, in addition to a 
salary of fifty or sixty francs, which brings their 
wages up to a hundred and fifty or two hundred 
francs a month, besides which they are lodged and 
fed if they have no home in the city. All this varies 
somewhat in the different establishments, but a capa- 
ble sales persons should receive about fifty dollars a 
month. 

Employees can be sent away on twenty-four hours' 
notice, and there is a system of fines that are likely 
to eat into profits. There is a fine for sitting down 
or attempting to, though there is nothing but the 
edge of a drawer that could be utilised (in England 
seats in the shops have been made compulsory), a 
fine for not putting back goods on the shelves 
promptly and for talking, except on business. It is 
a hard schedule for a day that begins at eight and 
ends at eight, with a half-hour for lunch and another 
for dinner. 

Where the employees " live in," the men and 
women are entirely separate in their leisure and 
work; what their morals may be when they take their 
evenings and Sundays out might be summed up in 
many cases as " mysterious." 



THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 195 

The small shopkeeper closes his shop at midday 
for an hour or two for the noon meal and a siesta or 
a game of dominoes with a friend at the cafe. This 
is what one meets with all over Italy, France and 
Spain, even where the shops live just on the business 
of the tourist. At most some one can be roused 
from a family dinner in the back to come to wait 
on an exigent customer, but usually the souvenir 
must go unbought until signor, sehor or monsieur gets 
back on the job again. 

HOLLAND AND BELGIUM 

Every coachman and taxicab driver is in league to 
see that you don't forget your lace when you come 
to Brussels. No matter in which direction you drive, 
whether to a restaurant or picture gallery, you in- 
variably find yourself brought up before one of the 
many shops, each one of which claims to be the oldest 
establishment devoted to the manufacture of the fa- 
mous Rose Point. Indeed, they all seem to carry 
an equally good stock, and prices are seemingly 
reasonable. It has been said that the only two real 
bargains in Europe to-day are jewels and lace, so 
much has the average European shopkeeper raised 
his prices to meet American standards. 

All of Brussels seems to have lace fever, your 
hotel porter, your boarding-house keeper, all have a 
favoured house where they declare you can get the 
best bargain in laces. It is very interesting to visit 
one of the manufactories, for the lace which was 



'196 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

once made altogether in homes is now manufactured 
on businesslike and commercial lines, and in the 
process, as usually happens, artistic value has been 
sacrificed to a large output. It is not then astonish- 
ing that there is so much cheap Brussels lace in the 
shops of Brussels. 

There is the Mechlin lace, too, which can be 
bought in Brussels quite as well as in Mechlin or 
Malines, but all these little Flemish cities are worth 
a visit on their own account, whether you are hunting 
bargains or not. 

The linen of Ghent, too, is said to rival that of 
Dublin, though the prices are slightly higher, but 
the old bleaching grounds still around these old Flem- 
ish cities are evidence enough that the bleaching is 
done on the correct lines and not by artificial means. 

No one ever got through Belgium yet without a 
desire to possess a supply of the old copper and brass 
utensils still in common use. Enthusiastic art stu- 
dents are conscienceless enough to carry off their 
water jars in their trunks when they leave the delight- 
ful little village where they have spent the summer 
sketching, but as most of these charmingly battered 
brass jugs can be bought from their owners for some- 
thing less than a dollar one could afford to be moral. 

Amsterdam is the centre of the diamond industry, 
but for the shopper tourist more of these stones are 
offered in the Rue de la Paix than in this quaint old 
Dutch capital. There is nothing that makes such a 
stir in the business circles of Amsterdam as a big 
sale of diamonds, and if one does venture on buying 



THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 197 

a fifty-thousand-dollar necklace of these precious 
stones, it is well to understand that it is like sending 
a wireless around the world. One's home govern- 
ment, and dealers alike, it is hinted, keep wonderfully 
correct tabs on any transaction of magnitude in Eu- 
rope where jewels are involved. 

Silver is another specialty of Amsterdam. It used 
to be old Dutch silver, but it is rather difficult to 
get the genuine article now, even at any price. How- 
ever, such excellent and ingenious replicas of the old 
Dutch spoons, ornamented with wind-mills whose 
sails turned round, and plump cows and quaint Dutch 
figures are offered, that they are quite as well worth 
buying as were the originals, and the prices will be 
quite stiff enough too. 

SWITZERLAND 

One shops in Switzerland for embroideries, for 
knit underwear, for watches and for furs — certainly a 
catholic assortment. 

Saint Gall is the centre for the embroidery trade, 
done so cleverly by ingenious machines that it might 
pass for handwork; it is quite possible that much of 
it is bought by the tourist under this delusion, but 
this is their own mistake. Formerly most of it was 
done in the homes, like so much of the product of 
the peasant industries of Europe, but it is concen- 
trating in central factories that, with constantly im- 
proving machines and the big output, are killing off 
the hand embroideries. So much is this so that only 



iq8 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 



in Apenzall is any great volume of real hand em- 
broideries to be found. 

The little girl embroideresses, who sit outside of 
the big embroidery shops of Lucerne, are survivals 

in a way, and are mostly 
from this canton. Their 
tight braids are held with 
the silver comb of the 
Apenzall, and they, like 
the little waitresses, wear 
the peasant costume, and 
bend above their embroid- 
ery frame, over the eye-de- 
stroying work, at the hours 
that the women turn out 
from the Luzernerhof and 
the Hotel National for 
the excitement of strolling 
through the tasteful and 
tempting lace and embroidery shops. They do also 
the initial work so much in demand on purchases, and 
the delicate ornamentation of the handkerchiefs and 
small articles. 

In the lavishly embroidered underwear the quality 
of the material is not infrequently sacrificed to an 
elaborate decorative effect; this is true of the cheaper 
grades at least. 

It is an open question as to how much more profit- 
able it is to load down trunks with knitted underwear, 
under the impression of getting bargains, which they 
certainly are not after the duty is paid, than buying 




THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 199 

the same thing at home. And does one come abroad 
for such prosaic goods? 

Far better the watch of Geneva, which in price 
holds its own against much equally good competition 
at home and abroad. The watches are, to a large 
extent, still made in the homes of the workers by 
piece work, and from Swiss workshops came the in- 
vention of the thin, non-bulky watch, dearly beloved 
of the woman, some of them not much thicker than a 
fifty-cent piece. 

As for furs it is possible that one might catch up 
on expenditures here, for the dressing of furs, if 
not the growing of them, very nearly reaches per- 
fection in Geneva. 

Perhaps one buys more milk chocolate than any- 
thing else in what is usually a hurried rush across the 
Alps. There are many brands of this, almost as 
thin as the watches, but it doesn't make much differ- 
ence which mark one prefers, for most of them are in 
a trust. 

Wood-carvings are supposed to be a low-priced 
specialty of Switzerland, but they are quite as low- 
priced and equally attractive at Saint Claude, in the 
French Jura, and in any one of a half-dozen Black 
Forest villages. 

GERMANY 

In shopping in Germany one is more apt to get 
the real thing than in many Continental countries. 
There is a penalty if the shopkeeper advertises a 
thing other than as it is; if it is part silk and cotton 



200 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

mixed he cannot sell it as all silk, nor can he advertise 
in the grandiose fashion of our own land and others, 
to the effect that a certain article is the best in the 
world, that there is none so good and like statements 
of a misleading nature. 

Germany is growing to be the most progressive 
country in Europe, and is not behind in its shops. 
One of the most complete department stores in all 
of Europe is in Berlin in the Passage Kaufhaus. It 
is one of a chain of great department stores, and is 
an exposition in itself, decorated in the ornate Ger- 
man taste, after the most modern development of 
the art-nouveau. The attractions of our department 
stores pale beside the glitter, electrically lighted 
fountains and gorgeous marbles that suggest, truth 
to tell, a beer-hall quite as much as a place to shop. 

German department stores and her beer-halls rival 
each other in magnificence. Both are " done up " 
in the gorgeous ornate modern style of German 
art, florid, overpowering, loaded down with orna- 
ment, heavy and massive, like the Germans them- 
selves. No matter how the most modern of art 
be applied to decoration the influence of the mediaeval 
German art influences it still. German goods and 
German taste do not make a strong appeal to the 
American taste; the Germans have not a happy sense 
of colour; they are peculiarly tasteless in their colour 
combinations. Their workmanship is of the best, 
however, that is, in the expensive grade of goods. 

Austrian novelties attract the American perhaps 
more than any at the present time. From both 



THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 201 

Germany and Austria come ornamental leather work, 
coloured and stamped leathers, small articles for per- 
sonal use. 

The coloured, stamped designs, quaint figures and 
landscapes on tablecloths, on children's aprons, and 
the coloured table linen in blue, white and red de- 
signs is very popular among the Teutons; indeed it 
is hard apparently for the Germans to get away from 
staring colours, but heavens, how inartistically it is 
used! 

ITALY 

Florence is the shopping centre of Italy; it cer- 
tainly gives a fillip to the ordinary procedure of buy- 
ing things to make purchases in shops that have been 
in business, if not from Dante's day, at least back 
in the mists of a couple of hundred years, which fact 
is not a small asset with some of the shops of Italy. 
Of course one must bargain in Italy, and any notable 
bargain price simply means that you are getting some- 
where within sight of the original price at which the 
article was intended to be sold. 

The Italian shopkeeper is ingenious and appeals 
to the bargain instinct latent in the inveterate shopper 
by giving a commission besides on purchases to those 
who can bring trade to his shop. There are women to 
whom the treasures of the Uffizzi and the Pitti 
Galleries are as nothing compared with getting a lire 
or two thrown off of intrinsically valueless bits of 
bric-a-brac, which in the end they have to give away 
as presents to get rid of. 



202 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

Italy is a little too much like a big bric-a-brac 
shop. The lace and embroidery industries that are 
being encouraged in many places, such as Sienna and 
in Sicily, are more worthy of patronage, and if nice, 
white, sugar-loaf marble statues are required it is 
worth while to turn out of the modern Pilgrim's Way 




long enough to visit the quarries of Carrara, near 
Massa, where they originate. 

If Italy has one specialty it is hats — the straw 
hats of Tuscany that can be bought at any price in 
the markets of Italy, even for a few cents. Every 
woman and child plaits straw for these hats. One 
sees them in town and country alike mechanically 



THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 203 

manipulating a handful of straw as the peasant 
woman of France eternally clicks her knitting needles, 
all this for a few cents a day. Felt hats, too, come 
from Italy, and there is foundation for the rumour 
that some of the best American felt hats with 
Broadway trademarks come into being by way of 
Italy. 

The American tourist is trusted abroad in all 
money dealings with a confidence that is astonishing 
and almost touching, making them blush for their 
home business methods. The ease with which credit 
is thrust upon them speaks well for the way in which 
Americans abroad have met their end of touring obli- 
gations. Of course the fact that the foreigner sees 
Americans through a golden nimbus has something 
to do with this, but certain it is that he treats them 
with a liberality that he does not display towards his 
own people. The shopkeeper will put himself to no 
end of trouble for his customers from over the sea, 
and the big Paris shop will send hundreds of dollars 
of goods to your hotel without any guarantee but 
your expressed desire to make a selection. 

One can have C.O.D. packages follow them all 
over Europe, and such have been known to turn up 
six days out at sea on the return voyage. A piece 
of antique jewelry catches your fancy in Florence, 
but as you will not be able to tell the exact state of 
your finances until you get to Rome you forego even 
the pleasure of thinking that you would like to own 
it. That is nothing; the obliging shopkeeper offers 
to send a clerk down to Rome with the jewel, deliver- 



204 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

ing it to you there against payment. Somehow or 
other you get away from the shop, but somehow or 
other you have also impressed your name and ad- 
dress upon the proprietor. 

You forget Florence in your eternal round of the 
Eternal City, and go on to Naples in the same forget- 
ful mood, and though he may not have caught up 
with you as yet, the clerk and the jewel are on your 
trail. On the gang-plank of the homeward bound 
steamer he smilingly confronts you — you who have 
only an exhausted letter of credit left — with the 
package. It is easy to see what profit the transaction 
must represent. Just imagine a situation wherein a 
New York shopkeeper chased a prospective customer 
as far as a Boston steamship pier, on no greater 
encouragement than a mere glance of approba- 
tion. 

In a diligence of the Swiss Federal Post, with its 
six horses creeping laboriously up the Furka Pass, 
sat an elderly woman from a western prairie town. 
Her knotted hands had known the broom and wash- 
tub in days not so very long ago, but seriously, in- 
telligently and conscientiously, she was doing her 
European stint in the wake of a progressive daugh- 
ter. 

They had only a few scant days in which to reel 
off the Rhine, after Switzerland, and get to their 
steamer, but throughout that Alpine mountain climb 
the burden of the old lady's talk was that Paris must 
be revisited for at least two days; " for you know, 
my dear," this to the reluctant daughter, " before 



THE EUROPEAN SHOPPING TOUR 205 

we go back I must get me that black cashmere 
dress." 

After all, is this not what shopping abroad means 
— going back home with that dress bought in Paris, 
and for whose sake we are willing to defy even the 
hundred-dollar limit. 




am 

man 



DRESS IN HARMONY WITH SURROUNDINGS 

INFLUENCE OF CLOTHES ON THE MIND 

AVOIDING THE LABEL OF " TOURIST " 

THE AMERICAN GIRL AND THE SHIRTWAIST 

INDIVIDUALITY OF THE FOREIGN WOMAN 

THE HAT A EUROPEAN CLASS DISTINCTION 

AMERICAN ATTITUDE TOWARDS THINGS FRENCH 

EVENING DRESS 

THE CLOSE FRENCH CUT 

UNECONOMIC BLUE SERGE 

DELICATE MATTER OF LINGERIE 

THE " DESSOUS " 

PROFITABLE TRADE OF THE CORSET-MAKER 

CLOTHES AND THE GERMAN WOMAN 

THE FRENCHWOMAN'S METHODS 

EXPENSE ACCOUNT OF A PARISIENNE 

SOME FRENCH ECONOMIES 

" MAKING UP " 

DISTINCTION OF THE AUSTRIAN WOMAN 

WHERE STYLES ORIGINATE 

BERLIN ADAPTS PARIS MODELS 

HATS IN SPAIN 

SPANISH LENTEN DRESS 

ARISTOCRATIC DRESSMAKERS OF LONDON 



VIII 

CLOTHES AND THE WOMAN 

There was once an American woman with a tem- 
perament who made a point of dressing as nearly as 
was practicable in the style of the particular country 
through which she happened to be travelling, declar- 
ing that by putting oneself as nearly as possible in a 
mental and outward harmony with one's surround- 
ings, that then only could one arrive at a just esti- 
mate of values and get to know intimately a foreign 
country and its people. 

Acting on this theory she went to Redfern's in 
London for the severest of tailor-mades, while for 
Scotland the same house turned her out a travelling 
dress of shepherd's plaid, with which she wore a 
jaunty Scotch cap, ornamented with a pheasant's 
feather and a cairngorm buckle. In Ireland she 
wrapped herself in the long red cloak of the peasant 
woman, and only regretted that she could not carry 
a shillalah, but made up for the lack of it with even- 
ing gowns of Irish lace and silk poplin. Paquin de- 
signed her a trottoir of the approved French scanti- 
ness that fitted like a glove and was a size too small, 
but in which she could cultivate the chic air of the 
Parisienne, carrying at the same time a toy terrier 
under her arm. 

209 



210 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

She turned sportswoman and hunted in the Aus- 
trian forests with skirts to her knees, long leather 
boots, and an eagle's feather stuck in a green Tyro- 
lean hat. It was all her friends could do to keep 
her from embarrassing them by going about Holland 
looking like a " Baker's Chocolate " girl, so she com- 
promised by collecting silver wire buttons from the 
natives and sewing them on her coat and wearing as 
many extra petticoats as she could comfortably get 
about in. 

She plaited her hair in braids in Germany, wore 
a military, visored cap, and a woollen blouse, and 
discarded her Parisian corsets. In Switzerland her 
Alpine hat was always wreathed in eidelweiss, and 
she never went out without an alpenstock, though 
she never climbed higher than the embroidery shops 
in the village. In Italy she hung herself about with 
coral chains, and in Spain dressed in discreet black, 
with a black lace scarf in place of a hat, and dis- 
carded her Baedeker for a fan. 

With no mean ability as a linguist and much 
dramatic instinct she was thus able to project her- 
self into sympathetic relations, to her own satisfac- 
tion at least, with those with whom she came in con- 
tact. Naturally much of the lady's time was spent 
in tailor and dressmaking establishments, but some 
modified scheme on these lines might be of real assist- 
ance to the tourist. 

Aside from the scientific deduction that dress does 
influence the mind, it is well, if possible, not to em- 
phasise the fact that one is a tourist any more than 



J 



CLOTHES AND THE WOMAN 211 

can be avoided. The fact is patent enough and the 
American woman will find it to her advantage to 
modify, when she goes abroad, any pronounced style 
of dress tending to stamp her with too much in- 
dividuality and unduly blazon her nationality abroad. 
This is not by desire to discount her patriotism and 
undervalue her national pride, but simply in her own 
interests. It is not either that she should dress like 
the foreign women en tour — the patron saint of 
fashion (if there is one) forbid! No nation can 
send out into the world women so correctly and ap- 
propriately dressed for the journey as can America. 
The American woman's shoes, belts and neckwear 
are an object lesson to feminine Europe. But by 
studying the little differences that exist between one's 
own taste and that of the foreigner, adopting acces- 
sories of toilet that mean both much and little and 
eliminating any marked mannerisms of dress, the 
American woman can save herself from many little 
side annoyances that breed those complaints so often 
made against foreign manners and foreign looks 
especially. If expense is any object, to give the native 
as little chance to classify the traveller as possible 
does away with much of the overcharge and accusa- 
tions of extortion that are beginning to embitter the 
American in his relation with the foreigner. 

An observing Scotchman remarked once that the 
reason the American girls looked so much alike must 
be because they all wore shirtwaists. Certain it is 
that the American woman is less individual in her 
dress than the rest of femininity, and the catch phrase 



212 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

of shop-clerk and dressmaker alike in America is: 
" Everybody is wearing it " — this is the first, mid- 
dle and last argument in favour of any newly- 
launched article of wearing apparel. 

No woman keeps closer in touch with the changes 
in fashions than does the Frenchwoman, but she 
can always give them a turn that is best suited to her 
personality, and no matter how pronounced the mode 
she invariably stamps it with her individuality. So 
does the German and English and Italian woman, 
though not always to their advantage, not having 
the discriminating taste of the Frenchwoman to be- 
gin with. 

When the American woman gets on the other side, 
this trait of dressing like everybody else becomes 
more apparent. If it is the season for green veils, a 
verdant streamer flies from every hat; if it is the cult 
of the velvet bow, every girl's chin nestles in one. 
The hats are all tipped at the same angle, all orna- 
ment is of the same family design, — with the stron- 
gest individuality of all feminine creation the Ameri- 
can woman shows it least in her outward appear- 
ance. 

The blue serge suit is almost a uniform for the 
travelling American woman. Thoughtfully con- 
sidered, it is one of the most uneconomical and unsuit- 
able of materials for hard wear, which fact the 
automobile is demonstrating, and incidentally is 
giving it a hard knock by bringing into favour 
mixed goods of indeterminate colours. The soft 
greenish-greys that the English affect so much 



CLOTHES AND THE WOMAN 213 

for outing clothes, the kind that one could fall into 
the water with and come out looking all right with a 
little brushing off, are fast catching on among fer- 
vents of the automobile of both sexes. 

Nothing attracts more attention than the recent fad 
of the bare head. When the American woman breez- 
ily motors through the towns or along the country 
roads, carries her hat in her hand in the train and 
bares her head to cooling mountain breezes on an 
outside seat on the top of an Alpine diligence, it 
provokes not a little comment and not a few smiles 
by the way. 

A Frenchwoman explained the situation. " Mon 
amie, never go without a hat, or you will be taken 
for a peasant woman, not even does a lady go across 
to a neighbour's without putting on a hat, she does 
not even sit in her own garden bareheaded — outside 
the house the chapeau est toujours de rigueur." 

So the wearing of a hat is a class distinction, evi- 
dently to be rigidly observed if one does not want 
to lose caste, but Americans have introduced many 
things abroad and they may be successful with this 
craze if their fickle fancy doesn't meanwhile turn to 
something more novel. 

The prevailing attitude of the feminine world is 
towards all things French in dress. That it is French 
necessarily implies always something a little overgay, 
something that is outre — not to say wicked — and this 
is a fact which often biases the usually discriminating 
American woman in selecting her Paris dresses. Un- 
less things are decidedly " loud " or bizarre she feels 



214 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

that they may not be sufficiently " Frenchy " in style 
to be unmistakably genuine. 

The keen Parisian milliner and dressmaker, know- 
ing this, fosters this spirit, or rather delusion, and 
fits out his American patrons in costumes and toilet 
accessories that are only affected by the people of the 
stage and the " queens of the left hand," and while 
the American is getting wiser in this respect, and the 
sharp-witted Parisian will not be slow to follow, 
it is true that a certain class of spendthrift Americans 
has for long been a profitable joke to those plungers 
in the Bourse des Chiffons. 

Genuine French dressing is distinguished by a care- 
fully studied sobriety and an exquisite and harmoni- 
ous blending of colour. These are its real character- 
istics, and any combination that " hits one in the 
eye," to use their own phraseology, too vividly, may 
be set aside as being a spurious trashy thing. A lot 
of poor and unworthy stuff is sent out — even from 
Paris; there are even plenty of genuine antiques that 
are bad art, so it is not strange that all Parisian 
clothes are not in good taste. 

The Englishwoman has an air of " full dress " 
about her evening costume that is never so notice- 
able in the American; the latter is still averse to 
baring her head and shoulders in public places, while 
the Englishwoman goes to the theatre, to public 
restaurants as well as those in hotels, in a decollete 
evening gown and no hat. She does the same thing 
on the Continent and gets stared at, for while low- 
neck is universal, where society goes at least, the 



CLOTHES AND THE WOMAN 215 

women of other countries make a point of wearing a 
hat — only called so by courtesy sometimes, but still 
the head is covered. Under the same circumstances 
the American may wear richer clothes but will be 
more puritanically veiled, although she may too dis- 
card the hat. 

Paris is the woman's city through this same 
question of clothes. Paris still makes the fashions. 
Breathlessly do all makers and wearers of feminine 
garments await the edict and laws of this despotic 
queen who reigns by the banks of the Seine, but 
wisely is the American adapting them to her own 
style. The broad-shouldered, deep-chested American 
woman realises that what is suitable for the slight, 
small-boned Frenchwoman does not become her ath- 
letic lines. Fewer dresses are being made in Paris, 
though their workrooms are being haunted more and 
more if but for the snippings that fall from the 
scissors of those artists of the needle. And though 
the Parisian dressmaker is trying to give the desired 
American cut, sleeves are still too short, armholes 
too tight and backs too narrow. The tradition of 
the Paris woman is a question of line. The lines 
of the form must be accentuated, not hidden, hence 
everything is close-fitting; also the motive of economy 
enters into it and, as in most things French, cloth 
is scrimped to the closest possible margin. This 
makes for trimness and chicness it is true, and with 
her well-coiffed hair, slightly gummed to stay in 
place, the Frenchwoman does produce a harmoni- 
ous whole, beside whom the best-groomed woman 



216 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

of other lands at times is apt to look the least bit 
frowsy. 

But it is to the dessous that belongs the real 
credit of the elegance of the Frenchwoman. This 
delicate matter of lingerie is her peculiar heritage, 
and in the gout des deshabilles she rightly declares 
lies the whole secret of the fine art of dress. 

A Frenchwoman spends more money on her under- 
garments than on her dress, and she never econo- 
mises on her corsets. From the woman of society 
down the scale to the little shop-girl, all equally 
recognise the importance of the dessous, and French 
lingerie has become the standard set for the well- 
dressed woman. 

This taste in lingerie comes not only from an 
innate elegance, but is made possible through the 
education and ability of the Frenchwoman with her 
needle. Her school-work is largely the science of 
embroidery, and rarely is the Frenchwoman, at home 
or abroad, without a bit of needlework in her hands, 
and in odd moments she makes herself much of the 
laces and embroideries for her garments. Even the 
most uncouth French peasant girl is taught the art 
of embroidery of an elementary kind. The under- 
garments of the French workingwoman are, as to 
quality and garniture, a revelation in comparison with 
those of the same class elsewhere. 

The Frenchwoman would as soon think of buying 
a ready-made dress as a stock corset; both are equally 
repugnant to her taste, a feeling that runs down the 
entire scale of feminine France. The modish woman 



CLOTHES AND THE WOMAN 217 

will willingly spend as much as fifty to five hundred 
francs on a pair of corsets and have one for each 
costume, while the petty bourgeoise will pay from 
twenty to thirty-five francs for corsets made to order, 
though she will make her own dresses and skimp on 
the children's food to do it. 

This practice is responsible for the trade of the 
corsetiere, one of the most lucrative professions 
open to women in France. Paris suburbs are full of 
the comfortable little homes of retired corsetieres 
and their husbands who have retired also on the for- 
tunes made in the manufacture of these " les armoi- 
ries des femmes." 

Corset shops abound all over France and in the 
provincial towns the general stores often do not stock 
corsets at all. They can be made as cheaply as the 
ready-made. The French department store corset, 
however, is more expensive than the same grades in 
America, and is very often either of American or 
German make. 

As one leaves France behind, the elegance of the 
corset diminishes. Whether to the practice of not 
wearing corsets, so general in Germany, is due the 
shapelessness of the German article of commerce, or 
whether it is that the inartistic lines of the home- 
made product have discouraged the wearing of them, 
the fact is that the corset has been largely discarded, 
a fact which puts the last accent on the unfortunate 
lack of taste of the German woman, and is respon- 
sible for that national institution — the German waist- 
line. 



218 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

The Frenchman has expressed his disapproval of 
the heavy calf-skin American shoe : " Pas pour les 
dames," he says, and the Frenchwoman listens. The 
eye of man is the mirror in which she gauges her at- 
tractiveness; above all does he admire femininity. 
All the same, the American shoe, or a fairly good 
French imitation of it, is deposing the Louis Quinze 
heel and unnaturally long vamp shoe that has made 
every one wonder how the French footwear ever 
got its reputation for grace and beauty. 

Another shattered tradition is that of the heavy 
English walking-boot. The English wear most gen- 
erally a thinner-soled shoe than the American. The 
American shoe is gaining in favour, though the Eng- 
lishwoman complains it does not stand up under the 
strain of getting wet most days in the year as does 
the more acclimatised British article. 

The Frenchwoman may have lost her feet to a 
foreign shoe, but she has kept her head. The 
French hat is made an integral part of the coiffure 
and is not simply an inverted basket of bizarre orna- 
ment. The secret of the Frenchwoman's hat lies 
really in the care which she gives to the arrangement 
of her hair and the accuracy with which she poses 
the hat upon her head. 

If the Frenchwoman is the fashion mannequin 
who promenades the world's stage before an inter- 
national audience of buyers, it is well to study her 
methods nevertheless. She spends less on her dress 
and gets better results than woman of any other 
nationality. How does she do it? Economy alone 



CLOTHES AND THE WOMAN 219 

won't accomplish it, though she is past mistress in the 
art. 

To begin with, dress to the chic woman is a busi- 
ness, not an amusement or the excitement of merely 
" buying something " regardless of its suitableness 
or use. Then she follows the injunction of the an- 
cient philosopher: " Know thyself." No vagaries 
of fashion can possibly lead her to fall in the pit of 
unbecomingness. She has catalogued her good 
points, and knows how to accentuate them. Like all 
her people she is at heart an artist, which she com- 
bines with a financial sagacity that is remarkable. 
The chic Parisienne does not always patronise the 
" grands faiseurs," but by a system of shopping 
around finds out when a " premiere " or head- 
saleswoman of one of the big couturiers is about to 
set up in business for herself. As often happens, such 
a one will give astonishing reductions to attract the 
clientele of her former employers. This is one of 
the ways by which feminine Paris dresses as well and 
more economically than the stranger who comes with- 
out a roadmap to the heart of this land of fashions. 
Just here may be put in a word of warning. Don't 
trust too implicitly to that class of Parisian woman 
who, for a money consideration, or a friendly inter- 
est, guides the footsteps of the tourist through the 
shops and offers to take them to her own dressmaker, 
or her special little modiste whom she can influence 
to let one have things so cheaply. The stranger stands 
a better chance of getting fair treatment at the well- 
known shops. The petty graft of the " Commis- 



220 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

sion," which always in the end comes out of the client, 
taints the attitude of Paris towards the stranger with 
a full purse and a meagre knowledge of the language. 
The true Parisienne is not anxious to give away her 
secret economies. 

A Frenchwoman would commit most of the sins in 
the calendar rather than be demode, and one way in 
which she keeps keyed up to the latest harmonies of 
fashion is by using cheap material and following 
closely in the wake of new models. It is thus that she 
is able to appear at the correctly ordained intervals 
required by fashion in the requisite number of new 
costumes throughout the year. She prefers to do this 
rather than buy costly and good material which 
could not be lightly discarded, thus being obliged 
to wear them after the first bloom of style had 
faded. Neither has the made-over any attraction for 
her; "it can always be detected," she will tell you. 

She does though understand the art of the " res- 
sert " — of utilising old stuff. A gown may be sold, 
or even exchanged, or a ball declasse dress serve as a 
jupon, but the remodelled dress plays no part in her 
wardrobe. In this she scores over the economies 
of her sisters of other nations. 

A Parisian journalist of renown has recently com- 
piled, after a careful study of the question, what may 
be considered a fair expense account of a wealthy 
Parisienne. It totals seventy-five thousand francs, 
say fifteen thousand dollars, but its purchasing power, 
as compared to what the American could do in Paris, 
may well be estimated at double that figure. 



CLOTHES AND THE WOMAN 221 

Her tailor, milliner and coiffeur use up forty thou- 
sand francs of this sum, the remainder being devoted 
to the accessories of the toilet; she is wise enough to 
know that nearly half of her expenditure is none 
too much for minor articles. Naturally this cannot 
be made to include jewels, other than slight ephem- 
eral novelties. 

The capable Parisienne again can often accom- 
plish on twenty thousand francs what an American 
would usually have to spend twenty thousand dol- 
lars to duplicate at home. But to be a thorough 
Parisienne on this amount requires a knowledge of 
values that the American must spend years, not 
months only, in Paris to acquire, beside being pos- 
sessed of a no mean financial ability. 

The Parisian woman plans out a campaign years 
ahead, replenishing certain parts of her wardrobe 
each year, and an intelligent system is set into opera- 
tion for remaking, redying and renewing other arti- 
cles with each season and demi-season. One year she 
will buy a costly set of furs, another year it will be 
a handsome costume trottoir from the Maison Worth 
instead of a new ball gown, which has served but once 
or twice at the opera and can thus be considered as 
new for the ball this year. It's a game that the 
capable Frenchwoman plays and plays well, for it 
is her real passion. She has Napoleonic ability when 
it comes to money matters in spite of her naivete. 
Any extravagance is only on the surface; she buys 
nothing because she " can't do without it " ; she gets 



222 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

full value according to her tastes, at least, for all 
she spends. 

Still further down the scale is the pseudo-chic Paris 
woman who makes a wonderfully good imitation of 
a queen of society on four or five hundred dollars 
a year. The stranger cannot hope to compete with 
this. The fashionable dressmaker or milliner is not 
on her shopping list. She gets a " working out " 
seamstress to come to her home at from six to ten 
francs a day, two meals included. Together they 
work side by side and turn out a pale copy of one of 
those creations that bear on their labels, in letters of 
appropriate gold, the great names of the Faubourg 
Saint Honore or the Rue de la Paix. She makes in 
the same way a satisfactory substitute for twenty 
or thirty francs a hat that would cost five or six hun- 
dred on the Boulevards, and with the exception of 
the obvious inferiority of material she looks as well 
when she promenades in the Bois as one of the vrai 
chic mo tide. 

The custom of " making-up " is universal among 
Frenchwomen, hence the most effective and compli- 
cated battery of aids to beauty originate in Paris. 
Such is their reputation that a French label sells 
anything. 

The Frenchwoman makes no concealment; there 
is no furtive " touching up " for her. She dyes her 
hair with henna, plasters her face and paints her lips 
as if she is making-up for the glare of the footlights. 
She takes not less than an hour for her coiffure. It 
is carefully given a lustre with one liquid and a 



CLOTHES AND THE WOMAN 



223 



glossy smoothness with another preparation. She 
conceals nothing. She considers her person as an 
artist does his picture — a work of art, and cares not 
at all that the brush-marks are visible so long as the 
artistic ensemble is satisfactory, no matter how arti- 
ficial it may be. 

Dress elsewhere in Europe is a colourless and 
spiritless imitation of Parisian style spoiled by local 




peculiarities. A notable exception is that of the Aus- 
trian woman, the most distinguished feminine per- 
sonality in Europe. 

The Viennese wear Parisian modes plus a distinc- 
tion of their own. When the foreigner wants to pay a 
genuine compliment to the American woman abroad 
he says, " Dear Madame, I thought you must be 
Austrian." The Austrian women in their build and 
style of carrying their clothes more nearly resemble 



224 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

the American. They are the feminine aristocracy of 
Europe. 

Berlin, Madrid, St. Petersburg, all the European 
capitals follow meekly the lead of Paris in styles, 
while the dressmakers of Paris in turn are as cos- 
mopolitan a guild as their world-wide clientele. Bel- 
gians, Austrians, English and Americans; such is the 
varied nationality of those that go to make up the 
Paris tailor and dressmaker world — the aristocrats of 
the profession. Do others of the countries of Europe 
originate any styles? Apparently not. Berlin does an 
enormous trade in ready-made clothing. But how? 
She imports Paris models, bowdlerises them, adapts 
them to suit her own trade and then exports them 
to all points of the compass — to South America — and 
— let it be understood — to the United States as well. 

In one country the hat might be, and frequently is, 
discarded to advantage, and that is Spain. In place 
of a hat the Spanish woman wears a small black lace 
scarf over her head, or only a piece of black net; 
invariably is this the case when she goes to Mass, and 
as the upper-class woman when seen out of doors is 
either going or coming from church this sombre head- 
dress seems universal. If the stranger woman arrives 
in one of the big Spanish cities in Holy Week before 
Easter she will feel as conspicuous in her hat as she 
would in a bathing costume. It is the equivalent of 
having a label with the words, " I am a foreigner," 
bound across her brow, and passersby are not shy in 
letting her know how eccentric they consider her taste 
by remarks as well as looks. 



CLOTHES AND THE WOMAN 



225 



Religious etiquette prescribes the wearing of black 
during this week, and every woman of every grade 
of society is garbed in unrelieved black with the 
black lace head-scarf. As the week is spent visiting 
all the churches the effect of the streets is an unend- 
ing procession of these 
mourning gowns, and 
powder-whitened faces 
which have much to do 
with heightening the 
effect of the sehoritas' 
black eyebrows. Soci- 
ety wears rich black 
satins, frequently lined 
with stuff of another 
colour, a soft rose or 
blue. This is an in- 
genious way of serving 
both God and the 
World, and produces a 
charming effect when 
skirts are lifted, though 
it seems rather sym- 
bolical of the idea that penitence has not penetrated 
very deeply. 

In London what are known as the " West End " 
Court dressmakers are the aristocracy of the pro- 
fession, and not infrequently are members of the 
aristocracy itself, pushed into business by necessity 
and often bringing with them their impecunious lady 
friends as assistants. 




226 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

This society dressmaking sometimes makes up in 
style what it lacks in business ability, but if one wants 
the right kind of dress in which to be presented at 
Court, it may be well to overlook an inflated bill 
for the advantage of being fitted out for this impor- 
tant occasion by one who has been through the 
ceremony herself, and can thus supply hints on eti- 
quette as well as feathers for the hair. 

Indeed, it is quite a business, this making of the 
Court costume for the democratic American woman, 
anxious to bow before Royalty, but then, as every 
one knows, woman is an aristocrat at heart. The 
expense of one of these costumes is of course any- 
thing one wishes to make it, but the Englishwoman 
will place the estimate not far from $1,000 for 
the long Court train of just so many yards, the three 
white feathers, and the long floating veil. Now 
the aspirant must be coached for her difficult part, 
and this means usually a Godmother quite unlike the 
fairy Godmothers of old, inasmuch as she does not 
bestow gifts herself, but expects a substantial return 
for her assistance. 

It is said that there are not a few of the reduced 
nobility who have gone into the business of pre- 
senting the wealthy American woman at Court, sell- 
ing their names and position for American dollars. 

All shopwomen wear black, and as black is really 
the badge of the serving class, the Englishwoman 
herself keeps away from it. It is very rarely that one 
sees it used, unless in case of mourning, and then it is 
even considered in good form for the friends of the 



CLOTHES AND THE WOMAN 227 

family to put on black; the servants dressing in the 
same hue at the expense of their masters. 

In London one can dress as elaborately for the 
street in the afternoon as one wishes, but this comes 
from the habit of driving rather than walking and 
this is the result of cheap cabs. When one can get 
about for twenty-five cents a time it is economy on 
clothes to take a cab. The same holds good in Paris, 
and though the Parisian is not so prodigal in cab- 
fares, she is most careful of her clothes, which is the 
underlying secret of the fresh appearance at all times. 
She never wears a street dress in the house, and as 
she lives in her peignoir until noon, her clothes get 
just half the wear of the ordinary woman's. The 
Frenchwoman has adopted half-heartedly the tailor- 
made — the trottoir — but she only wears it when it 
can't be avoided — in her rare morning outings and 
for travelling. 

In London, too, the tailor-made is not considered 
the proper thing after luncheon, any more than it 
would be after six in the evening. 

Credit in England is too facile; it is easy to fall 
into the habit of running accounts for as long as 
one may wish, when it is actually difficult to get a 
bill presented. The usual method when an account 
is presented is to pay something on account only. 
11 Why," says the Englishman, " a tailor doesn't 
want his bill paid up in full; he would think he was 
going to lose his customer's patronage if you paid 
him up; what he wants is only a few pounds paid on 
account and another large order put in." This is 



228 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

unquestionably so. This system of holding custom 
reacts on both sides — the customer is charged more 
to cover the accommodation and the firm is often 
unable to meet expenses in spite of big outstanding 
accounts for which they fear to dun. 

Women will keep themselves in debt to their dress- 
makers not only in the matter of clothes, but will 
borrow money from them. The question of clothing 
oneself in England is a problem in more ways than 
one. 






I ^/Mon $ZJress/7?&/cer>s 




THE KINGDOM OF CLOTHES 
BOURSE OF FASHION AND BEAUTY 
WORTH, THE FIRST MAN DRESSMAKEB 
THE MAN DRESSMAKER AND HIS MET>DS 
CREATION OF A COSTUME 

" THE WEALTHIEST STREET IN THE )RLD " 
REDFERN, THE MASTER OF LINE 
LEGEND OF THE TAILOR-MADE SUIT 

OUTPUT OF THE PARIS DRESSMAKINESTABLISH- 

MENTS 
AVERAGE PRICE OF A PARIS GOWN 
WORKROOMS OF THE GREAT HOUSES 
DRESSMAKERS' ASSISTANTS 
LOW SCALE OF WAGES 
THE FAMOUS HOUSE OF PAQUIN 
HISTORY OF THE MAISON DOUCET 
DIFFICULT ROLE OF THE " MANNEQUIN 
FASHIONS AND HORSE RACES 
LAUNCHING NEW STYLES 
LITTLE " MIDINETTES " 
HOW THE DRESSES ARE DELIVERED 
THE INDEPENDENT AMERICAN 
SUPREMACY OF PARIS THREATENED 
11 ACADEMIE DES MODES " 
COMMERCIAL IMPORTANCES OF PARIS I 






IX 



THE MEN DRESSMAKERS OF PARIS 
AND LONDON 

The kingdom of clothes is in the heart of Paris, a 
kingdom of extravagance set within a kingdom of 
pleasure, a territory bounded by the Rue Royale, the 
Rue Taitbout, the Chaussee d'Antin and the Rue de 
Rivoli. It is the stronghold of feminine fashions and 
its capitol is the Rue de la Paix, the Street of Peace 
indeed! rather it is the Street of Strife, a place of 
relentless competition in an attempt to please a fickle 
public. 

In this area, too, the majority of the money-spend- 
ing strangers put up, for Paris fashion-makers and 
Paris hotels of the super-luxurious class are in close 
relationship. 

Here, within the space bounded by a few city 
blocks, are quartered the world's most renowned 
masters of the a r t of costume, the most exclusive 
perfumers, soap-makers, artist-milliners and furriers, 
the most modish corsetieres and the most expert 
lingeres, the most chic, most brilliantly seductive and 
smartest craftsmen and women of fashion's realm. 
If clothes make the man, how much more do they 
have to do with the turning out of that highly finished 
product, the woman of to-day? 

231 



232 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

Here in the world-famous establishments are those 
equally famous creators of feminine fashions, the 
artistes du chiffon, who lay their brainy talents at the 
feet of those women from all countries who, coming 
thither on a common mission, here meet on common 
ground, to be adorned, as only here they can be 
adorned, no matter what the cost. 

This is the world's Bourse of Fashion and Beauty, 
with ticker ribbons of real silk, in whose show-rooms 
the competition for leadership is as keen as on the 
floor of the Bourse of High Finance at the other 
end of Paris, where the juggling of gold and stocks 
and bonds makes possible the Bourse of Chiffons, as 
the French themselves name it. 

The sovereign rulers — for the land is a divided 
empire — are kings, not queens; the celebrated 
couturiers, the masters of the Ecole de Modes, are 
men. It may be that no woman has sufficient de- 
tachment from self to do justice to another feminine 
personality, though it was only recently that Madame 
Paquin — the spouse of " the great Paquin " — was 
welcomed to that exclusive woman's club, La Fran- 
chise, by the Duchesse de Rohan, who hailed her with 
an address on the art of elegance and lauded her for 
her generous attitude towards the working girls of 
the Paquin establishment. 

The great establishments of Doucet, Felix, Francis, 
Paquin, Worth and Redfern were all founded by 
men of astute perceptions in divining the needs of 
woman as related to clothes. And yet the man dress- 
maker is a recent development in the business of mak- 



MEN DRESSMAKERS 233 

ing fashions, dating back only to the sixties and the 
reign of the Empress Eugenie. She may have been 
responsible for the loss of an empire, but she was the 
instigator of the modern style in woman's clothes. 

Curiously enough, it was the Englishman, Worth, 
who invaded Paris with new ideas in woman's dress 
and established there the first masculine-controlled 
dressmaking establishment. It was he who first con- 
ceived the lucrative combination of supplying the 
material and the confectioning thereof. From this 
first effort of the English draper's clerk, Charles 
Worth, has been built up the enormous business of 
the Paris man dressmaker, until to-day the imprint 
of one of these Paris ateliers of dress has become the 
hall-mark of the well-dressed woman of the world. 
The man dressmaker of Paris is thus seen to be an 
importation in the first instance, and this would seem 
to prove that it was the Paris atmosphere, rather 
than the individual, that has given the product its 
fame. 

Not only did Paris designers follow Worth's lead 
from the first, but other Englishmen recognised the 
statesman-like qualities that foresaw the necessity of 
using Paris as a base of operations, so that to-day the 
chief of the great London houses are but understudies 
to their Paris headquarters. Worth, Paquin and 
Redfern labels are sewn into gowns in London dress- 
making establishments and the designs of the parent 
house are followed, but only after the seal of approval 
has first been stamped upon them by a critical Pari- 
sian clientele. 



234 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

The show-rooms of the leading houses in the trade 
are luxurious salons de reception furnished with taste 
and art, served by a staff of perfectly dressed assist- 
ants clothed in discreet black, as a foil to the clients, 
and possessed of gracious manners. They are there 
to receive, and as much social grace and tact is re- 
quired of a saleswoman at Paquin's or Doucet's as 
of a maid of honour at court. 

The methods of the man dressmaker are those of a 
maitre 3! art. He studies his client as an artist studies 
his motif. Women of the chic beau monde, and of 
the ofttimes equally chic demi-monde, crowd his salons 
with fluttering hearts. Will the great designer but 
think them worthy of his choicest inspiration? These 
holders of the sceptre are capricious; not always will 
money do the trick. With them it is Art with a 
capital A and their masterpieces must have the correct 
setting, otherwise they will not sell. 

The head of the Rue de la Paix establishment 
studies his beautiful client as one would a painting, 
in the most favourable light. " Come again to- 
morrow, madame." Madame loses all track of so- 
cial engagements in this creative period of a costume 
and is on time the next day. The maitre shakes his 
head sadly; the inspiration has not yet come. 
Madame goes away disheartened; perhaps she is not 
worthy ! 

In a meditative mood monsieur goes for his daily 
drive in the Bois. It is autumn and the Bois is all 
golden against a sky of silver grey. " Voila, I have 
it ! " And monsieur hurries back to his entresol, 



MEN DRESSMAKERS 235 

making feverish notes on the way and madame's cos- 
tume now begins to form itself. 

He summons his head designers and under his 
personal direction the delicate fabrics are composed 
into a harmonious whole. When madame next 
arrives on the scene a creation awaits her in gold and 
brown — like the autumn leaves, veiled in delicate 
greys — like the autumn mist that hangs over the for- 
est pools, " and that are deep and dark, just like 
madame's eyes." There has at last been produced 
an autumnal symphony that does justice to madame's 
chdtain beauty. This is one man's method of pro- 
ducing masterpieces. 

Bond Street is London's centre of fashion. " The 
wealthiest street in the world," say the English, a 
statement more complimentary to their patriotism 
than to their knowledge of things elsewhere; the 
wealthiest street of its length, no doubt. This radi- 
ating point for English " smartness " is a narrow, 
lane-like passage that connects the fashionable 
thoroughfare of Piccadilly with the commercial 
thoroughfares of Regent and Oxford Streets. It was 
in its capacity of a connecting link that Bond Street 
made its fortune. 

The English man designer of woman's clothes ex- 
cels in the composition of severe lines. It was Red- 
fern who popularised the tailor-made gown in Paris, 
and from there disseminated it throughout the world. 
There is a house of Redfern in London, but it is a 
question as to whether the Paris establishment does 
not do the largest trade. Whether it is that clothes 



236 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

follow woman or that woman follows clothes, the 
supremacy of Paris is still unquestioned. 

This popularising of the " tailor-made " gained 
for Redfern the sobriquet of " maitre de la ligne " 
from the French. He is known by the smartest 
dressers as the greatest artist of all the famous men 
designers; that is, he occupies his talents in bringing 
a gown into harmony with the natural lines of the 
figure, rather than to the exploiting of a certain style 
of robe. Much of his inspiration is gained from a 
study of the costumes of the historic past, and as a 
designer of modes for the theatre, based on a careful 
study of periods, he stands unique among his com- 
petitors. 

The legend of the tailor-made suit is handed down 
like this : Queen Alexandra and the royal trunks failed 
to make connections on the occasion of a certain 
ceremonious dinner at a brilliant English house-party. 
The Queen, too gracious to spoil her hostess' 
plans, resourcefully directed her maid to cut off the 
skirt of her riding habit (those were the days of 
the trailing habit), for the royal party had ridden 
across country on horseback, and lightening its black- 
ness with a red rose thus appeared at dinner as if 
nothing had happened. 

It was in this manner that the distinctive garment 
that the English dressmaker still turns out better 
than any other was born. 

Sixty per cent or more of the dressmaking business 
done in that half-mile radius of which the Place 



MEN DRESSMAKERS 237 

Vendome in Paris is the centre, is for a foreign 
clientele. 

The output is further categoried thus: Part is 
knowingly sold to commission agents and intermedi- 
aries of foreign private buyers; still other portions 
to English, German and American dressmakers, and 
by far the largest sale is to foreigners visiting Paris, 
perhaps for that very purpose. The Parisian and 
French provincial clientele actually buy but a bare 
third of the output. This of itself is out of all propor- 
tion to the fame of the well-dressed Parisienne, but 
proves that she does not of necessity patronise the 
makers of marque alone. It is a well-recognised fact 
that most of the makers have a special clientele 
which, for one reason or another, they serve at prices 
considerably below those usually quoted. 

Possibly ten millions of francs is a figure which 
to-day covers the output of each of the half-dozen 
most famous makers, divided among four or five 
thousand open accounts, some of them of small mo- 
ment, but others, by reason of the social or other 
prominence of their owners, reaching fabulous sums. 
Publicity is an art known well to the Paris couturier. 
There is, too, among them a sort of mysterious 
" Dun's " or " Bradstreet's " which divides the good 
payers into a " liste blanche," the average payers into 
a " liste jaune " and the bad payers into a " liste 
noire." It is said, too, that not all of those of the 
" liste noire " are those lowest in life's station, the 
contrary being chiefly the case. A well-defined loss 
has been arrived at by an actuary in the trade, who 



238 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

estimates it at fifteen per cent. Like the clients of 
the doctors and the dentists those of the " lute 
blanche" of the dressmakers pay the bills for those 
of the lists " jaumes " and " noires." 

An enormous business has been developed entirely 
from the example of Worth. There are many clients 
of these establishments who spend readily enough 
from twenty-five to thirty thousand francs in ordering 
a season's gowns at one or another of these now 
world-famous establishments. It is even recounted 
that a fair American once spent the sum of three 
hundred and fifty thousand francs in half a day of 
choosing and commanding. And yet it is said that 
the average price of the Paris-made gown is but seven 
hundred francs. It must be that they make up in 
numbers in order to approach the fabulous sums which 
are accredited to their account. 

Into the total thus spent silks enter to the pro- 
portion of forty-six per cent, laces for thirteen per 
cent, passementeries for eleven per cent, furs eight per 
cent, embroideries seven and one-half per cent, 
feathers for two per cent, the various other ac- 
cessories, such as threads and linings and whalebones 
and what not, for the remainder. 

The ateliers where these famous Parisian confec- 
tions are turned out are the hives where many grades 
of working women and girls earn a livelihood, a 
miserable livelihood many of them, catering for the 
luxurious tastes of the rich. In the first rank are 
the coupeuses, the cutters, who parcel out the stuffs 
according to given measures. Next comes the 



MEN DRESSMAKERS 239 

appreteuses, who are the first sewing hands, the bas- 
ters; then the mechaniciennes, the machine stitchers; 
and the couseuses, the hand sewers who do the finer 
work and are called picturesquely, " les petites mains." 
The making of a gown is divided further among four 
distinct classes of workers, the corsagieres, the 
garnissenses, the jupieres and the lingeres. 

The wealthy stranger sees nothing of this but a 
handsomely furnished apartment where the models 
are shown and an equally conveniently arranged salon 
d'essayage peopled by a score or more of attractively 
dressed employees : vendeuses, port toilettes, manne- 
quins, fitters, etc. There may be a hundred or more 
working unseen in gloomy workrooms. 

The principal employees, the first hands — the pre- 
mieres, and perhaps the mannequins and one or two 
of the other privileged classes, earn a fair competence 
as a result of their month's work, but the thousands 
of mere working girls who are employed in the in- 
dustry are scarcely better off, perhaps not so well off 
in many cases, as factory workers. For twelve hours 
or more a day the more expert may earn as much 
as four or four and a half francs at the maximum, 
though the wage of by far the greatest number 
hardly rises above three francs while there is work, 
and then there is always the dull season to contend 
with when the greater part of the workers are laid off. 

Another class which has not a little to do with my 
lady's Paris gown are the workers in chambers, for 
a lot of this work, supposedly the product of this 
famous capital of beauty, is put out with workers in 



i 



240 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

a dull, frigid mansard chamber where, in many in- 
stances, a wage of from two to two francs and a half 
a day is considered normal. How indeed does the 
other half live? 

Paquin, of all the great couturiers of Paris, enjoys 
the widest international reputation. A gown from 
this famous house may be considered the apotheosis 
of modern woman's toilette. France thought enough 
of the master's services to decorate him with the 
Grand Cross of the Legion of Honour, and now that 
the head of the house is dead his widow is looking 
for the same distinction. There are serious-minded 
Frenchmen who ask apprehensively, " Will the high- 
est honour in our land, whose badge is a bit of red 
ribbon in the button-hole, become a trade-mark for 
a couturier; are the brains of our country falling 
wholly to the heads of our dressmaking establish- 
ments? " 

Another of the kings of the Rue de la Paix is 
M. Jacques Doucet, a scholar, an artist, an elegant 
and a cultured man of the world, habitue of Paris' 
most exclusive salons. There is scarcely a literary 
or artistic gathering of note held in the capital but 
where this slim, elegant " Louis XIV of dressmakers," 
as Paris knows him, is not an honoured guest. He 
is one of the best known figures in Tout Paris. 

The Maison Doucet began as a little open booth, 
selling casquettes, or caps, on the sidewalk nearly a 
hundred years ago. When Worth set the vogue of 
the man dressmaker Doucet was one of the first in 
the new field and quickly rose to the premier rank, 



MEN DRESSMAKERS 



241 



It is the French elegante who is the chief cus- 
tomer at Doucet's, more so even than the foreigner. 
The master's styles are designed chiefly as a foil to 
the elusive charms of the Paris mondaine. 

Art has often allied itself with commercialism. 
Du Maurier designed the still used label on the bottle 




of Apollinaris water and the Maison Doucet has the 
distinction of having had its first catalogue designed 
by Daubigny, that most sincere of French landscapists 
of the men of the thirties. 

Generation after generation of the same families 
of work-people succeed each other chez Doucet. 
Two hundred and fifty people are employed there 
as saleswomen, fitters, designers, mannequins, etc., 
besides six hundred girls in the workrooms and three 



242 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

hundred girls who do work for the house at their 
own homes. 

The mannequins play one of the most important 
roles in these Palaces of Modes. They are the live 
" dummies " on whom are displayed the costumes. 
All day long they must promenade the salons of the 
establishments where they are employed, revolving 
slowly before the eyes of a critical battery of cus- 
tomers, that the effect of the gown may be better 
judged on a living figure than it may on a thing of 
wires and papier-mache. 

Frequently there is a stage upon which the manne- 
quins play their parts, parts which call for quite as 
much endurance as the most tragic roles of the real 
stage. Endurance, tact and skill in their highest 
forms are all called for, and upon the ability of the 
mannequin to impress the buyer with the graces of a 
particular gown depends the sale quite as much, in 
many instances, as upon the skill of the designer or 
the insinuations of the salesman or woman. The 
physical and mental strain is unceasing. From nine 
in the morning often until nine at night the manne- 
quin must be on her feet, changing from one costume 
to another at the caprice of the most erratic of 
clients. Her position and advancement depend upon 
her ability to clinch sales. All her natural and arti- 
ficial charms are brought to bear. The mannequins 
are selected for their svelt figures and for their beauty 
of face as well as of form. They wear a tight-fitting, 
black sheath garment, over which the gowns are 
shown. 



, 



MEN DRESSMAKERS 243 

A mannequin in a swell establishment is paid some- 
thing like thirty dollars a month, perhaps a little 
more if her reputation as a seller is particularly good. 
Another service which she renders is posing in public 
places in the new creations of her employer that a new 
fashion may be well launched in the eyes of the 
public. She may be seen at Longchamps on the day 
of the Grand Prix, at Armenonville, at the Pre 
Catelan, indeed wherever fashion congregates. On 
the occasion of the Grand Prix she is generally out 
in full force, parading in the paddock as in the 
tribunes, or strolling in the enclosure reserved for 
high society. She will perhaps be dressed in the most 
bizarre of creations and be followed greedily by all 
eyes, but she glides along, seemingly unconscious of 
the throng or the part she is playing, though she 
divides the honours with the horses and the jockeys. 
All feminine Paris studies the mannequins on parade 
at Longchamps greedily and on the verdict does a 
new style catch on or fail. Betting on the success of 
a new style is as exciting as the " Pari-Mutuel " at 
the Grand Prix. 

The little midinettes, who get their name from 
their habit of promenading the streets at the midday 
hour, are the youngest of the workers in the dress- 
making establishments. The midinette has taken the 
place of the grisette of the days of Murger in the 
imagination and affection of the Parisian. Arm in 
arm they throng the pavements of the great arteries 
of fashion at the noon rest hour. They earn the 
smallest possible of living wages, not more than a 



244 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

franc to a franc and a half for a day of twelve, and 
sometimes sixteen, hours. This does not leave much 
of a margin for food and so they content themselves 
for the most part with a croissant or a brioche, eaten 
under some overhanging doorway or on a bench in 
the Gardens of the Tuileries, and this, with a swallow 
of black coffee which costs but a couple of sous, by 
some mysterious law of nature, serves to keep them 
so cheerful and ingenious of mind that they are able 
to costume themselves in a way that imitates the chic 
styles in dress with which they are so continuously 
brought into contact. 

It is a dangerous atmosphere in which these young 
girls live and work, spending so much of their lives 
in the reflection of luxury and extravagance and 
taking their pleasures on the pavements of a great 
city. Paris regards them sentimentally, as it does 
most feminine questions that are vital, and a society, 
known as the " Ligue de Mimi-Pinson," has for its 
object the improvement of the conditions which sur- 
round the little midinette. It is too weak and 
sentimental, however, in its motive and operation to 
be of much real service to the cause which it sup- 
posedly represents, its chief demonstration of activity 
being evinced in the annual ball which it gives in 
order to secure funds for its work. 

Last on the list of the army of dressmakers' helpers 
in Paris are the troltins and conrsieres, the former 
name being more particularly applied to the errand 
girls of the milliners' establishments, and the latter 



MEN DRESSMAKERS 



245 



to those of the dressmakers. One sees either, or 
both, of these little workers at all hours of the day 
laden with hat or costume boxes as large as them- 
selves. These are carried by a not too conveniently 
arranged leather strap, and by such means is the bulk 




of the completed work of the makers of fashions 
delivered to their clients' homes. 

The trottins recently went on strike for higher 
wages, but the only result was this little chanson with 
which the trottins and coursieres now amuse them- 
selves by singing as they trot all over Paris with their 
big boxes: 

" Que demande une petite trottin 
De chez Worth ou de chez Paquin 



246 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

Un peu plus de salarie, 
Moins de travail a faire 
Et trois coups de torchon. 
Vive le son, vive le son. 
Bis, bis, bis." 

A suit recently brought in Paris against one of 
the most famous of the men dressmakers threw some 
light on conditions in the trade which made such 
apparently excessive charges as exist necessary to the 
conduct of such a business. Even the most simple 
of " tailor-mades " is an expensive proposition in a 
Paris shop. 

This was what the evidence showed: The cloth 
was first cut and measured and its cost estimated, then 
the cost of linings, trimmings and, what dressmakers 
the world over call furnishings, was carefully com- 
puted, to which was added the cost of the hand labour 
involved. A certain sum was added for reputation 
and another for professional skill in designing and 
fitting, when, finally, to this lump sum, was added 
another sixty per cent to make up for possible errors. 
In reality the latter sum was added to make good the 
losses on non-liquidating clients. 

Will Paris always be able to keep in the ascendency 
as arbiter of the world's modes? There are signs 
of uneasiness and fear that their kingdom of fashion 
is threatened from without. These Americans, so 
rich and so independent, and who are asserting more 
and more each season this same independence, and 
who are demanding that styles be adapted to their 



MEN DRESSMAKERS 247 

standards, will they not take some stand some day 
that cannot, or will not, be met? Has the Paris 
couturier reason to dread that this clientele, whose 
bills have been doubled (and as readily paid as 
those of clients of any other nationality) , may become 
too insistent in its demands, and finally throw down 
the gauntlet and proclaim that the productions of 
Fifth Avenue more than rival those of London and 
Paris. Is the Royaume de Paris threatened from 
Outre Merf 

We hear rumours that it is proposed to form an 
Academie des Modes to be composed only of those 
masters in the art of adorning and beautifying woman- 
kind. This association is to have for its object the 
safeguarding of Paris from the introduction of bas- 
tard fashions from across the frontiers. The list of 
" Immortels " of this academy will have to be in- 
creased beyond the original forty who now sit under 
the dome if the catholic plan is to be carried out of 
including beauty specialists, painters and all others 
interested in the art of beautifying and lauding the 
charms of woman. The keynote that is to be struck 
is of course that it must be French taste that continues 
to set the pace in the race of fashions and that there 
is reason to suppose that the French as a whole will 
be able to combat the dreaded invasion. 

The commercial importance of the output of Paris 
fashions was recently well illustrated in a startling 
way when a member of the Chamber of Deputies 
arose, in reply to a diatribe as to feminine extrava- 
gance, and said, " To attack the coquetterie of 



248 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

woman was to prejudice a national industry." And 
yet we American women fondly pride ourselves on 
the importance of the position we hold in our own 
national affairs. Has ever an American legislator 
arisen in favour of woman's expenditure in dress? 

In a quarter of a century the commerce of the men 
dressmakers in London and Paris, those who devote 
themselves solely to the confection of women's toi- 
lettes, has made a remarkable progress and, unlike 
the vogue of other times, it is not a monarchial 
society, but a democratic one that has inflated prices — 
the French bonrgeoise and the American millionairess. 

Less than half a century ago, when Worth was 
court dressmaker to the Empress of the French and 
his " turn-over " of affairs was something like five 
million francs a year, it was thought an incompre- 
hensible sum to be squandered on dress with the con- 
nivance of one man. To-day the combined turn-over 
of Paris dressmaking establishments shows an annual 
business of two hundred and fifty million francs, 
thanks (and it is the French themselves who say 
the gentle word) to " les transatlantiqiies" 



TF^ SOCIAL SIDE 




EUROPE DISCOVERS THE AMERICAN GIRL 

INTERNATIONAL SOCIAL RELATIONS 

SOCIAL AMENITIES IN THE BRITISH ISLES 

FRENCH SOCIETY 

THE ENIGMATIC FRENCHWOMAN 

FORMALITY THE HEIGHT OF POLITENESS 

MANNERS OF CONTINENTAL EUROPE 

ENGLISHWOMAN THE BEST HOSTESS 

REAL CHARM OF INTERCOURSE 

INQUISITIVE FOREIGN MIND 

GUESTS IN THE ENGLISH HOUSE 

TIPS AT HOUSE PARTIES 

OPEN-AIR PLEASURES OF SOCIETY 

FASHION IN THE BOIS DE BOULOGNE 

AN OUT-OF-DOOR DRAWING-ROOM 

" SENTIER DE LA VERTU " 

COUNTRY LIFE IN ENGLAND 

WHERE LONDON SOCIETY TAKES ITS AIRINGS 

11 CHURCH PARADE " IN HYDE PARK 

ROYALTY TAKES ITS TURN IN THE PARK 

ETIQUETTE OF CALLS IN FRANCE 

CHAPERON AND YOUNG GIRL 

THE CRY OF LIBERTY 

THE AMERICAN WOMAN AND THE EUROPEAN MAN 



X 

THE SOCIAL SIDE 

Having exhausted, at least to her own satisfaction, 
the charms of the English castles, German schlossen, 
French chateaux and Italian palazzi, the American 
woman craves to know something of the intimate 
life that exists behind these ancient walls from some 
other point of view than that of the personally con- 
ducted tourist and the information that Baedeker 
can give her. 

If she did but realise it, Europe is as anxious to 
know the American as she could possibly be to be- 
come acquainted with it. 

The American girl has at last been discovered in 
Europe and the repute of her charms and her dol- 
lars have penetrated to the most out-of-the-way cor- 
ners, where a few years ago not even the solitary 
traveller was seen. Europe watches with interest and 
curiosity the comings and goings of these "dollar 
princesses " who make no attempt to travel incognito 
in their triumphal progress across Europe. 

Hypnotised by her independence, charmed in spite 
of the shocks she gives to their traditions and con- 
ventions, they regard her as existing outside of the 
etiquette that governs their own femininity as much 
as if she had blown in from another planet. Also 

251 



252 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

they are beginning to differentiate between the Eng- 
glish " Miss " and the American " girl," and are 
able to class them, which is a better proof than can 
be put forth by steamship travel statistics of the in- 
crease in American travel abroad. 

They are at last ready to gauge her by her own 
standards instead of their own, a concession which 
shows an enlightenment as great as the Renaissance 
that followed the Dark Ages of history. 

The entry into social life is easy enough; all that 
is needed is time rather than opportunity. Money 
makes little difference, as the belief is current among 
all classes that all Americans are millionaires; this 
saves one the trouble of exactly defining her financial 
position. Indeed, they could not be convinced to the 
contrary, for does not the American schoolgirl spend 
money in so lavish a way that it scandalises the head 
of the average European family? The lack of cal- 
culation that Americans display in the spending of 
money is one of the most amazing traits from the 
point of view of a people who make every cent pro- 
duce results in a tangible form. 

When curiosity has been satisfied and the novelty 
worn off there is little in common, the American 
finds, between herself and her foreign friends, and 
acquaintance seldom warms into friendship. Funda- 
mental differences exist which can never be bridged 
over except by a superficial and formal structure of 
conventions and politeness, which is not strong enough 
to bear the burden incidental to a lasting friendship. 
Social international relations can never mean much, 



THE SOCIAL SIDE 253 

as America, in the essentials, is drawing further and 
further away from European ideas. 

This lack of assimilation is as noticeable in the 
British Isles as in a land where another language still 
further heightens the barrier. Sometimes it seems 
possible to demonstrate that the American has more 
in common with the French — at least in temperament, 
while again certain of us really come closer in touch 
with the Scotch; at least the English will tell one that 
what of our " Americanisms " are not to be found 
in Chaucer are lineally descended from the language 
of the Scot. 

English society welcomes the American, though they 
are as credulous about this dollar business as their 
neighbours across the Channel. It is but natural that 
the American should be most in evidence in Eng- 
lish society. Theirs was the shore where the wave of 
travel first landed the social aspirant, but all signs 
point to the fact that the ebb tide is in the direction 
of the Continent. An amusing fact is that the social 
amenities between English and Americans seem to 
flourish more genially when they band together for 
mutual protection, interests and pleasures on the com- 
mon meeting-ground of a foreign country. 

French social life is not only formal, but the enter- 
tainment to be got from it is thin. As with every 
move in their game of life things are done by rote and 
at no time is there any evidence of spontaneity. 

It seems impossible to be friendly with a French- 
woman; her blend of sophistry and childishness in the 
wrong proportions is confusing to any just estimate 



254 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

of her character. When it is possible to pierce the 
veneer of formality she appears even more of an 
enigma. This is perhaps her real charm — her Sphinx- 
like quality; for what she really thinks ever remains 
a lock to which the outsider has no key. 

Conversation is cut after a set pattern which has 
come down from the time of the Louis' along with 
the arrangement of the drawing-room furniture. Be- 
ginning at the fireplace the chairs are arranged in 
two rows down the salon facing each other, the 
hostess sits at the top of the row and next to her 
the important guests, dwindling down in social im- 
portance to the end. It is all reminiscent of a chil- 
dren's game and scarcely makes for cordiality. This 
arrangement holds good in the most unpretentious 
household. 

If Madame is modish she will have adopted the 
custom of serving tea and the accompanying cakes and 
bonbons; if it is in the provinces it will more likely 
be some sweet syrupy wine and biscuits, or sweet 
crackers. 

If one gets to the stage of the causerie in time 
Madame will receive in her boudoir, extended on a 
chaise-longue. She won't mind asking the most dis- 
concertingly frank questions about your most intimate 
affairs, from the size of your income to your opinion 
of your husband, which is all the more remarkable 
as they are rarely communicative about their own 
personal affairs with a stranger. This desire for 
knowledge is on a par with the curiosity that prompts 
one to prod the animals in the Zoo. 



THE SOCIAL SIDE 255 

Formality is the highest form of politeness with 
the French. The more coldly distant in his manner 
is the Frenchman the more he is demonstrating his 
politeness and high regard. It is not good form to 
stare into the eyes of a respectable woman, thus he 
pays you the compliment in conversation of playing 
his glances all about you in an impersonal way which 
is quite an art; in this respect his society manners 
and those of the Arab are the same. 

In European society it is still de rigueur for the 
gentleman to kiss the lady's hand on entering and 
leaving the drawing-room. It is only a stage kiss 
anyway, but the Frenchman and the Russian par- 
ticularly have set the fashion. French manners are 
the basis of good manners all over Continental Eu- 
rope, tinged though they may be by local mannerism, 
and the manners of the Paris salon are still the stan- 
dard for polite society. 

All French families of any standing have an ances- 
tor that was beheaded during the Revolution, a fact 
which is as useful as the prefix de in establishing 
their aristocracy. " Liberte, Egalite and Frater- 
nite " have a significance only in the political world; 
society and the woman, no matter whether under a 
president or a monarch, is never other than an 
aristocracy. 

To the Englishwoman must be awarded the palm 
of being the best hostess. The English entertain 
more intelligently than any other people. The Eng- 
lishwoman is accused of being cold and indifferent 
towards the social entertainment of her guests, 



256 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

whereas instead of following up guests with atten- 
tions in a way that would simply emphasise the fact 
that they were only guests, she gives them the freedom 
of the house to use as if it was their own. Instead 
of being burdened continually by a feeling of respon- 
sibility on one hand, and obligation on the other, 
hostess and guest are mutually independent, and that 
real charm of intercourse — freedom — is maintained. 

The complaint is heard that the English house- 
party is as non-personal as life at a hotel; whereas 
the actual case is that the Englishman has freely 
opened his house to you and therein you have the 
same right for the time being as himself. 

One is invited to the English house for a certain 
number of days, told even what train to take. A 
carriage meets one at the station. Whether there 
be a house-party or not you are only first met by 
servants and shown to your rooms, from which you 
descend at your leisure, perhaps only at five for tea. 
It is etiquette to arrange a guest's arrival to coincide 
as nearly as possible with the tea hour, at which func- 
tion, served in summer on the lawn and in winter in 
the entrance hall, one first meets her hosts and any 
other guests. One rarely sees the host before lunch- 
eon, after which amusements are devised for the 
guests, which they can accept or not as they like, but 
if your hosts see you at dinner and exchange a few 
words in the evening it is as much as can be expected 
in a big house full of people. 

The maid unpacks one's bag and lays out what 
clothes she thinks you may need without any tiresome 



THE SOCIAL SIDE 257 

questions and will further give one as much personal 
service as may be needed. 

The bugbear of English visits is supposed to be 
the tips. It is doubtful if their exactions are any 
greater than the same thing at home. English people 
themselves will tell one that they can't afford to visit 
their best friends on account of this same question of 
tips, and yet others who are on the visiting lists of 
noble earls declare that there is nothing to it; that 
they give the maid who fastens up their gowns ten 
shillings when they leave and that is all. There is 
something in knowing how to do it, but the guest 
across the water, ticketed by the sometimes incon- 
venient reputation for wealth, would probably not get 
off so easily. Some conscientious hostesses go so far 
as to put up notices in the guest-rooms to the effect 
that no tips are to be given, which suggest a cheap 
lunch place and is about as effective. 

The social season of all the European capitals 
extends well into the summer, and are all character- 
ised by open-air pleasures that do much towards 
breaking up the ordinary conventional round. 

From Easter to the National holiday — the four- 
teenth of July — is the apogee of the social round 
in Paris, when the Bois de Boulogne becomes the 
open-air drawing-room of Parisian society, and the 
green Allee des Acacias becomes the stage for the 
gay drama of mondaine world. 

From four to six every one makes for the Bois by 
way of the Avenue des Champs-Elysees. Private 
automobiles and horse-drawn turn-outs, filled with the 



258 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

best-gowned women of the world, circle the winding 
drives of the Bois, but not so fast that the costumes 
cannot be noted. They make the round of the Bois, 
stopping at Armenonville for an ice or the customary 
"five o'clock/' 

,The most fashionable promenade is the " Sentier 
de la Vertu." Only the fine essence of esprit, or 




the delicate sense of irony underlying the French 
character, could have evolved this name of " path of 
virtue," for a park walk. Here the cream of the two 
worlds of Paris comes for a constitutional before 
lunch. High-born ladies, and the high-priced demi- 
monde equally haughty, draw up in autos or low- 
swung victorias, descend and promenade under the 
fragrant blooms of the chestnuts or sit in the uncom- 
fortable little iron chairs. In these chairs the curious 
onlooker may also sit upon payment of two sous, 
and study the moves in the social game at first hand. 
Here friends rendezvous, engagements are made 



THE SOCIAL SIDE 259 

for those flirtations that the Frenchwoman ac- 
complishes with such charm and discretion; there are 
also others not so discreet. It is this intermingling 
of the two elements that produce one of the anom- 
alies of Paris life. 

Not far away is the bridle-path — the " Allee des 
Cavaliers " — where not a few " Amazones " (to use 
the rather exaggerated French name) are cantering 
along with their escorts. The craze for things Eng- 
lish since the "entente cordiale" went into effect 
has put the Frenchwoman on horseback, but she is 
not really fond of it, as the Englishwoman's strenuous 
exercise has little attraction for her. Under every 
woman's arm, or running shiveringly beside her, is a 
tiny toy dog. These " toutous" which they invari- 
ably call " petite coco cherie," are as much the in- 
separable companion of the Frenchwoman as her 
hat. 

On Sundays the Bois is deserted by the society 
element in favour of the bourgeoisie. The Bois is 
no longer chic on that day; it is the family day, when 
all the middle-class world of Paris takes a camp- 
stool under one arm and a lunch basket under the 
other (no wasteful hiring of chairs for them) and 
literally spends the day, coming early and staying 
late. 

English social life is just the reverse of what usu- 
ally holds good in France. The English family 
makes its home in the country and moves into town 
for a brief period, instead of living in the city and 
making the country the incidental part of the social 



260 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

season. Consequently the stay in London is purely 
a social business which the English family feels called 
upon to go through with as one goes to a fashionable 
resort, and this point of view makes possible the 
growing custom of simply taking a suite of rooms in 
one of the big hotels instead of opening a town house. 
Besides it makes for economy, and the sight is becom- 
ing common of titled ladies sweeping around hotel 
corridors afternoons in full court dress on their way 
to a " drawing-room " in the season. 

Hyde Park does not make such an extensive nor 
beautiful pleasure ground as the Bois, but no matter 
what may be the weather London society still uses it 
as a parade ground. The Englishwoman goes along 
Rotten Row every morning, followed by a correct 
groom at the regulation distance. The riding hour 
on Rotten Row is the most popular of the day, and 
here can be seen the smartest of the smart set and 
the best-groomed horsewoman in the world as she 
shows up at her best. 

The correct equipage, with pompous coachman and 
footman in powdered wigs and high-stepping pair, 
still remains the traditional gentleman's vehicle; the 
automobile by no means conveys to the minds of the 
crowd the same amount of pomp and circumstance as 
is evoked by the traditional coach and pair, par- 
ticularly if there be an earl's coronet emblazoned 
thereon. 

Neither is the plebeian numbered hack for hire 
allowed on the drive during these hours when society 
takes its airings. Ways are provided for the visitor 



THE SOCIAL SIDE 261 

to get over this difficulty; the hotels will hire out to 
one an imitation private carriage; all livery stables 
provide for this contingency, and even the Blooms- 
bury boarding-house keeps, or can get, a " private 
brougham " that can be rented by its guests and 
pass the scrutiny of the policeman at the Albert 
Gate. 

Hyde Park on Sundays sees that peculiar Eng- 
lish society function — the " church parade." This is 
a more intimate occasion, and the " Sentier de la 
Vertu " of the Bois would not be out of place trans- 
ferred to London, for everybody hastens here after 
church to promenade, prayer-book in hand, among the 
budding crocuses and narcissi in a silver-grey spring 
noon. There is none of the contagious gaiety of the 
French crowd, but the decorous, well-bred English 
throng is able to hide any dubiousness under a Sab- 
bath-day varnish. " Look respectable and you will 
be happy " is the English creed. 

Friends sit in groups on the penny chairs, discuss 
plans for the coming week, engagements, temporary 
and for life, are manoeuvred by mammas, and the 
Sunday church parade is often used to introduce a 
daughter to the social world. After this every one 
goes home to a roast-beef dinner. The French course 
dinner is not, even in fashionable circles, succeeding 
in separating the English family from its favourite 
dish. 

By five o'clock the carriages are so densely massed 
that it is only by courtesy it could be called driving. 
Royalty drives out with the rest. The rumour that 



262 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

the King is coming causes all the carriages to line up 
courteously to allow the passage of the royal landau 
drawn by two horses, marked as to its royal func- 
tions only by the royal red coats of the coachman and 
couple of footmen at the back. 

If one wishes to enter the social life of a French 
community the burden of taking the initiative rests 
with the newcomer. She is expected to make the 
first calls, but these are promptly returned. After 
the second round of calls the stranger will know 
where she stands, for if the acquaintanceship is not 
desired the call is not returned. The French have a 
system that provides for this. The proprietor from 
whom the house may have been leased or bought, or, 
in the case of a doctor or a professional man — his 
predecessor, furnishes them with a list of the desi- 
rable people who occupy the correct social standing. 
Thus in the end the power of selection lies with the 
majority, which may be logical though it places the 
stranger at a disadvantage. 

In many respects the French are slower to open up 
their home to one than the English, for they rather 
shrink from a new element that may possibly disturb 
the calm routine of their domesticity. 

" Chez elle " — with herself — that untranslatable 
synonym for a woman at home in France, expresses 
something even more intimate than the English home. 
The soft cream tint of the French house, with its 
formal row of pale-grey shutters, always closed, the 
high walls that enclose the garden and the high iron 
gates, backed with wooden or iron doors — all seem 




o 
o 

Q 



Q 



o 

CO 



THE SOCIAL SIDE 263 

symbolical of the closely guarded inner life of the 
French bourgeoisie. 

Even in France chaperonage is relaxing to some 
extent; the same is true of even its most conservative 
strongholds, though freedom for the young girl, as 
it is understood in America, does not exist as yet 
anywhere in Europe. In that most sophisticated 
social life, that of the French upper classes, the in- 
fluence of the young person, once practically nil, is 
beginning to be felt. She no longer keeps her eye- 
lids lowered when spoken to by a man, and at dances 
she boldly allows her partner to lead her out for a 
breath of air on a balcony — but still not for long. 
The old French ruling that a young girl should not 
walk out even with her brother — for how should the 
wicked world know that he was her brother — is be- 
coming obsolete, and family groups of brothers and 
sisters do go in company together on picnic outings 
and daylight amusements. The cry of the French 
girl for liber te is being heard, it is true (and that 
she makes it at all is a forward move), but not much 
attention is being paid to it. The curiosity and wist- 
fulness with which she regards the American girl 
with whom she is brought in contact is amusing and 
pathetic, and she is not heard criticising their bold- 
ness as frequently as do English girls. 

Young people's society is rather insipid for the 
American girl, once her curiosity is abated; running 
amuck of its trivial formalities and intricacies of 
language does not make for pleasure. Truth to tell, 
she gets on better with the European man. 



264 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

The American man rather expects a pretty girl 
to entertain him, in return for much candy, auto- 
mobile rides and a general putting himself usefully 
at her disposal. But the European man is trained to 
be agreeable to women and the practice of the small 
arts of conventional intercourse is a result of a 
large part of his training — in many cases the major 
part. The freedom and self-poise of the American 
woman fascinates him quite as much as his deferential 
attitude and charming manners do her. This, en- 
hanced by the golden halo that he invariably sees 
about her head, inspires him to put forward his best 
efforts to entertain her. 

Not a little of the interest that he inspires in the 
American girl often comes from a brilliant uniform 
and an authentic title. This, to begin with, makes 
him frame in so exceedingly well with the rest of 
the picture in her imagination, and it is the same 
imagination that he touches in many ways. He draws 
his heels together with a military click and kisses her 
hand deferentially at meeting and parting. No one 
does that at home — in public at least — and the little 
ceremony invests one with a certain importance. 
That his conversation takes a daring turn is often 
because of unwitting encouragement by one who is 
conscious of her ability to shut this sort of thing off 
if it passes the limits. But a radical difference be- 
tween home and abroad is that the American man 
can be made to feel ashamed of himself — the for- 
eigner — never. 

It rather worries the Englishman that the Ameri- 



THE SOCIAL SIDE 265 

can woman talks so much. He does not understand 
this voluble flow of talk, whether about something 
or nothing, that she knows is necessary to her popu- 
larity at home, and it sometimes happens that he is 
slow to appreciate her amiable efforts to please. She 
is not so much of a novelty to him as to the men of 
Continental Europe; besides he is in the habit of tak- 
ing the lead and being listened to, and he finds it a 
little wearisome to follow the conversational thread 
through the mazes and quick turnings given to it by 
the versatile American woman. But if given a chance 
he will take pains and can play the part of an agree- 
able host. Properly chaperoned he will invite her to 
tea in his " chambers " in London or at Oxford or 
Cambridge (if he be an undergraduate) and pour 
tea himself; but she will not be expected to go to 
the hotel or restaurant alone with him for tea, nor 
to the theatre, without some kind of a shadowy 
third, though it is true that being an American cov- 
ers many indiscretions. 

But the afternoon tea is the pivot around which 
the social life of England revolves, a function that 
can be made intimate or formal at will. Tea is served 
in the afternoon, not for the visitor but as a part of 
the daily routine, and one expects it quite as much as 
a matter of course as the shakings of the hand. Noth- 
ing is quite so pleasant as the tea hour before the 
open fire, when the rain, the slow, sure, continuous 
rain of the British Isles, turns everything misty- 
moisty. The teapot is kept warm under its padded 
cosey, the buttered muffins are hot in their covered 



266 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

dish, the plum cake is all plums. It is the hour when 
the English friend unbends to intimate talk under the 
shaded lamps. America is transplanting the custom, 
but it can never be the same as in England — the at- 
mosphere — and the climate — both are lacking. 




^'Pleasure 



cult of pleasure 

pleasure resorts of europe 

biarritz, the haunt of royalty 

spain summers at san sebastian 

fox-hunting and bull-fights 

air line from paris to madrid 

spanish society 

trouville-deauville, the newport of france 

England's riviera 

brighton and its bath chairs 

luxurious ostende 

bathing machines 

dutch society goes to scheveningen 

gay aix-les-bains 

" real french vichy " 

lucerne and its embroidery shops 

mediterranean chain of winter resorts 

the riviera quartette 

the woman's paradise 

aristocratic cannes 

nice the beautiful 

« pexitS CHEVAUX " 

A COUNTRY DEVOTED TO PLEASURE 



XI 



CITIES OF PLEASURE— EUROPEAN 
WATERING-PLACES 

The Cult of Pleasure occupies an important place 
in the scheme of things European; with us it is only 
an incident which enters, like many others, into our 
lives. We still feel a little ashamed to be overjoy- 
ous at home; indeed the means of enjoying ourselves 
is woefully lacking, and it is not always possible to 
get some one to " play with us," nor are playgrounds 
sufficiently numerous to hold for long the mercurial 
American who craves the champagne-like exhilaration 
of novelty. Neither Palm Beach nor Atlantic City 
(Newport does not count for the masses) stand for 
anything against the dazzling array of pleasure re- 
sorts across the water, with their cosmopolitan cloud 
of revolving satellites. 

It is at this moment, when we crave amusement 
the most, that we pack our trunks and take the 
fastest steamer for some European port. That old 
English idea that the " grand tour " of Europe was 
necessary to complete the education of a gentleman 
has become modified by the modern woman to include 
these three things — change, relaxation and pleasure. 
A study of man and womankind is quite as much of 
an education at times, and often a good deal more 

269 



270 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

amusing, than to keep one's nose always buried in a 
guide-book amidst the malaria of stale facts. Such 
an elusive thing as pleasure must be hunted down 
with wisdom. Europe has the secret and is ready 
for the pleasure-seeker with a chain of pleasure cap- 
itals that is never ending. 

The English expression, " watering-place," has a 
rather bucolic sound. That of the French is better; 
" ville d'eaa " is certainly prettier and more imagina- 
tive, far more so than the German spa. All, how- 
ever, spell pleasure. 

The gayest, most worldly, most fashionable of 
these resorts are in France. This may be due to the 
Gallic temperament and surroundings, for France is 
not afraid to promote those risque amusements that 
add a piquancy to the frivolous life of the gadabout 
that a more conventional nation is apt to banish from 
home, though her peoples are quite ready to seek 
them out under the French tricolour. 

" Liberty, Equality, Fraternity " are words which 
mean what they say and are truly to be applied to 
French pleasure resorts. 

France has the greatest variety of climate of any 
European country. This also makes possible, and 
profitable, her great array of pleasure resorts. All 
the world must come to her exquisite Mediterranean 
winter resort — the Riviera — in spite of the counter 
attractions of Egypt, Tunis and Algeria. For all 
the year round watering-places there are none that 
rank beside those of the equable climate of the French 
slopes of the Pyrenees. As a summer bathing-place 



CITIES OF PLEASURE 271 

of an ultra-fashionable type, nothing approaches 
Trouville. For the most approved modern " Cure," 
which can be taken in full dress, so to speak, Aix-les- 
Bains, in the beautiful French Alps, has no peer, 
unless it be Vichy in mid-France. There are dozens 
of other springs and baths here, too, whose repute 
is based more modestly only on their health-giving 
properties. Paris, for long the only great city of 
pleasure, still draws all classes of amusement seekers 
to her, and a centrifugal force throws them off 
again tangently all over Europe on the same joyous 
quest. 

Americans are only beginning to know Biarritz, in 
the Basque country, the furthermost corner of south- 
western France, hemmed in between the purple 
Pyrenees and the mists which roll up off the Bay of 
Biscay. Biarritz prides itself upon its exclusiveness; 
so fearful has it been of a contaminating popularity 
that it is only within a few months that it has en- 
joyed the luxury of direct railway communication 
with the outside world. Fashion first went to Biar- 
ritz by private carriage, then by automobile, but now 
it goes by rail without change of cars. 

From the beginning royalty, as much as any other 
element, has made Biarritz famous. The late Ed- 
ward VII set the recent fashion, for he never cared 
for the French Riviera; Leopold, king of the Bel- 
gians, of gay memory, had too much pre-empted that 
land of the Roulette Wheel as his own special hunt- 
ing ground, and it is also whispered that formerly 
there was a too much emphasised maternal solicitude 



272 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

radiating from Cimiez' Grand Hotel, above Nice, 
where Queen Victoria used to winter. Thus it was 
that Albert Edward when he became Britain's king 
picked on Biarritz, with its soft, mild air, as an 
antidote to the raw springtime of his homeland. He 




also found it a congenial place to which to retire with 
a circle of choice friends. 

Where the King goes society follows; individual 
preference is sunk in the loyal obedience to that which 
has the stamp of royal approval. The English, 
once having got in the habit, still come in crowds 
to Biarritz. 

From San Sebastian, Spain's royal resort just across 
the border from Biarritz, Alfonso, the Spanish Mon- 
arch, used to come frequently to visit his English 
brother King. The royal automobiles, like shuttles, 



CITIES OF PLEASURE 273 

ran back and forth over the international bridge be- 
tween Hendaye and Irun, linking up the dozen or 
twenty kilometres that separate the two resorts. 

Later, when Manuel of Portugal had greatness 
thrust upon him, he made the third of the royal trio 
at Biarritz. Grave questions of State of three na- 
tions were discussed on the golf links of the Basque 
resort, and along the winding walks, beside the red 
and ochre-coloured rocks that skirt the pale grey 
waters of Biscay's Bay. The privacy of the monarchs 
was respected to the extent that the crowd seemed 
not even to notice that they were there. It is easy 
to see that Biarritz was not at that time overrun with 
Americans; one could hardly imagine an American 
watering-place crowd exercising such restraint. 

It is only as a change from the English winter 
that Biarritz comes so to the fore as a " winter 
station." Its climate is fairly mild and even, but 
the grey clouds roll in from the sea, and the green 
combers break up on the shore, bringing in their train 
a superabundance of fine, misty rain which keeps a 
perennial dampness ever on hand. 

Biarritz is at its best and gayest in summer, when 
the Spaniards come across the frontier from the arid 
rocks and burning sands of their own land to bask 
in the balsamic odours of the neighbouring pine for- 
ests, or amid the sweet-scented magnolia trees of the 
gardens of the town. 

French society, too, comes in summer. " Biarritz 
is too English in the winter," say the Latins, with a 
shrug of their shoulders. Their complaint as to the 



274 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

denationalisation of this little corner of their land 
is not without some humour. Besides, the Riviera 
is the chic wintering place for the French. They can 
do the round of the Mediterranean resorts during 
the chilly months, and in the late spring get around 
to the Pyrenees and be free from June onwards for 
Biarritz. The Russian aristocracy crowd in also; 
they are to be found everywhere but in their own 
country, but this they lay to their climate, though a 
a matter of real note, the Russians are the greatest 
sports in Europe, and nowhere can they get that 
variety of gay life which they like so well in any- 
thing like the degree of free-handedness and luxuri- 
ance that can be had in the French resorts. 

The Empress Eugenie first made Biarritz the 
fashion when summering here in the uncertain days 
of the Second Empire. The only remaining souvenir 
of her reign is a big hotel, remodelled and enlarged 
from the once royal villa. 

These were the beginnings of the Biarritz of ultra- 
exclusiveness, of royalties and Spanish grandees, and 
from this it has blossomed out into one of the live- 
liest watering-places of Europe. Here is sport to 
please all tastes. The English who carry their sports 
all around the world with them, as they do the cut 
of their clothes, have imported fox-hunting into the 
neighbourhood, and the red shores of the sandy 
Landes around Biarritz are harassed by as correct 
a " hunt " of red-coated sportsmen as were ever seen 
in an English 'shire. Thus English society when it 
winters abroad is not deprived of its favourite amuse- 



CITIES OF PLEASURE 275 

ment. There is golf, of course, for nearly every 
resort in Europe has been obliged to lay out golf 
links and import a professional, usually a Scot, to 
look after it, as the hotel keepers have been forced 
to install bathrooms. 

Aeroplanes vie with automobiles in keeping things 
humming above and below. The air line from Paris 
to Madrid is by the way of Biarritz and San Sebas- 
tian. The national sport of the Basques is pelote, a 
charming game, reminiscent of squash, where the ball 
is batted to the wall by the players wearing long 
wicker gloves, somewhat like the flippers of a seal. 
At Biarritz it is at its best, and the bull-fighting is 
by no means third rate. The bathing is delicious in 
summer, which it is not on the north coast of Europe. 
Here one bathes in the open, not from a bathing 
machine. 

The promenade at Biarritz — always the centre of 
the " life " of a resort, is not the usual long, straight, 
windy walk. It winds picturesquely over rocks, be- 
tween flower beds and over rustic bridges thrown 
from spur to spur. Society dresses for dinner and 
strolls on foot or rides in some sort of a vehicle up 
and down before the long line of hotels. 

Expensive, Biarritz? Well, say ten dollars a day, 
if you really want to be in the swim, literally and 
figuratively, and as much more as you will, less if you 
try hard to keep the figure down. The English- 
woman of small income says that one can fare well 
at a certain modest little hotel for a dollar and a half 
a day, but it is not for this that one chiefly comes to 



276 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

Biarritz; rather it is for the life of the great hotels, 
and divertisements that in luxuriousness throw a 
glamour about things in a way that suggests cere- 
monious society functions more than the mere com- 
mercial transactions with hotel keepers. 

San Sebastian is the Spanish counterpart of Biar- 
ritz, the nation's one fashionable seaside resort. It 
is tucked away in a corner just sufficient to allow of a 
breathing spot facing the cool waters of the north 
Atlantic. Here the flower of Spanish society re- 
laxes in a manner amazing to the outsider. Spanish 
grandees, sehoras and sehoritas there disport them- 
selves. Society apes things French, and the hotels 
are French in their appointments and cuisine. The 
only fairly good road in Spain leads from Madrid 
to San Sebastian, thus showing the importance of 
the resort in the eyes of Spain's automobiling mon- 
arch. 

Between the two Basque resorts, one in France and 
one in Spain, there is a constant interchange of cour- 
tesies. The gay world of San Sebastian motors over 
to dance and play bridge at Biarritz, and in return 
extends the honours of her royal bull-ring to her 
French neighbour. The Spanish women plaster 
powder on their dark faces until they look ashen; 
they dress as nearly like Frenchwomen as they can, 
and, it is said, gamble with zest and pocket their 
winnings without remorse. 

In spite of all this laxity, the young Spanish girl 
is chaperoned with astonishing severity. Society has 
abandoned the mantilla except for Mass, or at some 






*u 







J-i 

ID 

c 

O 



CITIES OF PLEASURE 277 

gala performance at the bull-ring, when, however, 
only the white mantilla is the proper thing. 

The Spaniards have apparently no objection to 
setting up a gambling concession on their borderland, 
but it is doubtful if they can ever hope to divert the 
golden stream from the little principality of Monaco, 
which would mean changing the course of the flood 
of tourists, who, like an endless caravan, have got 
the habit of marching up to the very doors of Monte 
Carlo's Casino before pulling up. 

Between San Sebastian and Biarritz one can be 
as gay as one wishes. Prices are high in Spain for 
anything really good, and for this reason it is more 
satisfactory to see San Sebastian from Biarritz. 

Trouville, in the North, is the Newport of France. 
It is not so exclusive as Biarritz, for it is too near 
Paris for that. For two months of the summer 
it is Paris-by-the-sea, but it is even gayer and 
more dashing, and a good deal more unconven- 
tional. 

After the races at Longchamps in July, high so- 
ciety prepares for its summer exodus. It is obliga- 
tory for society to show itself at Trouville for at 
least a fortnight. At heart the French mondaine 
does not in the least care for outdoor life; she only 
looks upon it as a part of the social game, and her 
only thought of the seashore is that it is a new 
theatre for her activities, and that she will have an 
opportunity to dress for a new part. 

The Frenchwoman does not relax to the detriment 
of her looks. There is no driving about bare-headed 



278 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

in automobiles, for she does not court tan nor sun- 
burn. She sits on the sands at Trouville, under the 
bright, striped awning of an umbrella-like tent, with 
curtained sides, in a pliant — a folding-chair — or in a 
hooded wicker chair, with a becoming arrangement 
of cushions, but all the time correctly gloved and 
veiled. The Frenchwoman dreads nothing so much 
as the sun. 

No sight of its kind is quite so gay as that of the 
sands of Trouville at four in the afternoon. Side 
by side with the discreet family groups and their 
carefully guarded, convent-bred daughters, the nota- 
bles of the Paris demi-monde disport themselves on 
the beach in the most startling and briefest of cos- 
tumes, of a kind suggestive of an aquatic vaudeville 
show. The tactics employed are reminiscent of the 
evening life along the Paris boulevards or in some 
popularly frequented restaurant. 

One can bathe from one of a numbered row of 
bath-houses, little coop-like cages, or from a " bath- 
ing machine," while there are on all sides sturdy 
Norman fishermen hanging about, whose business it 
is to carry the timid out into the surf and teach them 
to swim — of course at a fixed price. The foreign 
feminine bathing costume is startlingly abbreviated, 
frequently consisting of but one tight garment. 
Stockings are not obligatory and by no means the 
custom, though canvas shoes or sandals are always 
worn. This necessitates the bathrobe being worn 
down to the water's edge, there to be dropped in a 
heap on the sand, or left in charge of a maid. Once 



CITIES OF PLEASURE 279 

in the water all deficiencies of costume are supposed 
to be hidden. 

Villa life is a feature of Trouville for those who 
desire any approach to quietness or exclusiveness, 
but the Hotel des Roches Noires is the centre of 
movement, and all the world and his wife is to be 
found there at one time or another of the day, or 
at the Casino, trying their luck at " Petits Cheveux," 
harmless enough if taken in small doses, and always 
a characteristic feature of a Continental resort, and 
one which must at least be tried once in order to 
fully sample the flavour of a French City of 
Pleasure. 

From Trouville one motors out to the Ferme Saint 
Simon for luncheon, and round about in all direc- 
tions is the charming Norman countryside, with 
thatch-roofed, half-timbered, quaint old Norman 
houses. 

At Deauville, Trouville's twin, just down the coast, 
is the summer capital of rank and fashion. Here 
on the famous seaside race-track is run the Grand 
Prix of the French provinces, the race attracting 
quite as much of the sporty, dressy element as is to 
be seen at Longchamps itself. This is peculiarly a 
phase of the summer life of Deauville-Trouville, as 
the twin towns are usually called. 

Dinard, on the Breton coast, to the westward of 
Trouville, tries to be exclusive, and folk on limited 
income here make a brave showing, which, in the 
comforts and variety with which they surround their 
summer life, compares favourably with that of their 



280 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

plunging neighbours in Normandy, though, after 
all, the keynote of French seaside summer life is 
only to be heard in its most melodic form at Trou- 
ville and its neighbouring summer cities. 

" England's Riviera " is a myth. It is not for a 
moment to be supposed that such a thing exists ex- 
cept in words. Brighton, " London-by-the-Sea," as 
it is called, is as far as the comparison can be justly 
carried. So far as England is concerned, Brighton 
is the " Queen of Watering-places," and affords an 
exemplification of the tradition that the English take 
their pleasure sadly. English smug society considers 
itself on the top wave of gaiety when it spends a 
week-end at Brighton. Saturday to Monday at the 
Metropole or the Grand, off and on during the 
winter, used to be the fashion, but the automobile 
has made it possible to make Brighton the end of 
a day's run down and back, with dinner at the Old 
Ship Inn, and so that rather faded hostelry has been 
furbished up anew and is more than running the 
modern establishments a close second. Brighton is 
supposed to be both a winter and summer resort — 
patronised by society in winter and trippers in 
summer, a tripper being one who travels on 
a cheap ticket with a return limit inconveniently 
near. Only by courtesy, and in contrast with the 
London winter, could Brighton be called a winter 
resort. 

One of Brighton's chief amusements is being 
pushed about in a " bath chair," a contrivance on the 
order of a perambulator, but not so sociable as those 



CITIES OF PLEASURE 281 

of the " Board Walks " of America, as it only ac- 
commodates one. Nothing is considered more exclu- 
sive than a daily airing in a " bath chair," the name 
coming from its first appearance at the one-time 
fashionable resort of Bath. Afternoons are spent 
on the iron pier. Every English seaside place has a 
long pier jutting out into the water, where one sits 
and listens to the band. Glass-covered shelters are 
at intervals along the promenade, allowing sitting 
out in the almost daily rain; by shifting occasionally 
one may also avoid the most contrary winds that 
blow. 

Hotel life lacks the French dash and brilliance, 
but the English have taken kindly to the great hotel 
at home as an amusement enterprise, and formality 
is relaxed to a degree unknown formerly. One is 
asked to make up bridge parties, and here the Amer- 
ican woman can shine, if she so wishes. A week- 
end at the Metropole is not a bad change from Lon- 
don in February — if you cannot get down to the real 
Riviera in the south of France. 

Bournemouth is farther to the westward, some- 
what nearer the Scilly Isles, where the warm sweep 
of the Gulf Stream makes bloom the narcissus in 
the open air when the crocuses are hardly out in 
the same latitude inland. Bournemouth is a resort 
for invalids of the real and imaginary kind, and its 
attractions in consequence are of the most homeo- 
pathic nature. A stroll under the pines, or in the 
pretty sunken gardens, being trundled about in a bath 
chair, or an afternoon visit to the tea-shop, are about 



282 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

as stimulating as any of Bournemouth's amusements. 

As a rest-cure the place is to be recommended, but 
it is totally unsuited to American taste, though mid- 
dle-class English society desires nothing better than 
a month at Bournemouth. Like all English resorts 
it is expensive out of all proportion for what one 
gets. 

Ostende, in Belgium, and Scheveningen, in Hol- 
land, are the only two outlets to the sea for north 
Germany, which has no pleasure city on her small 
seaboard, nor has Russia; consequently these two 
nations find their way to the Dutch and Belgian re- 
sorts. Ostende has probably the most beautiful 
beach (plage is the European word) of all. A mag- 
nificent brick-paved promenade — the Digue — stretches 
for a mile or more, on one side the vast expanse of 
smooth sand, and on the other a line of palatial 
hotels, the equal in price and appointments of any 
on earth. 

A prolonged stay at Ostende would eat the very 
bottom out of one's purse. Its water front is most 
spectacular, and the little city stands alone as the 
most luxurious seaside resort of its type. It was in 
a fair way to become a northern Monte Carlo, and 
its proximity to London and the big wealthy cities of 
north Europe gave an excuse for high play. But 
its glory has faded since public gambling was put an 
end to a year or so ago by the suddenly aroused 
conscience of the Belgian Government. All the 
same, prices have not slumped at Ostende, and its 
unrivalled bathing facilities still attract a cosmo- 



CITIES OF PLEASURE 283 

politan crowd to brave the rather damp bathing 
season which hardly extends over more than sixty 
days of midsummer. 

The open-air bath takes on a more decorous phase 
as one goes further towards the North Sea. This 
may be because of the chilling climate quite as much 
as a severer code of morals. 

One bathes here exclusively from the bathing 
machine, a little house on wheels; you enter, a man 
hitches a horse, and the " machine " is taken on the 
run down into the surf. The horse and driver go 
back to dry land while you undress and step down 
into the water as if out of your own front door. 
You enter again and dress, and, at a prearranged 
time, the horse and man come and drag the " ma- 
chine " out again. It is undoubtedly a most con- 
venient way of bathing, though there are stories of 
these sea-horses taking fright and running out to 
open water, setting the bathing machine adrift. One 
hires a bathing machine by the hour, day, week or 
season, and temporarily it is one's castle. 

Royalty often comes to Ostende, for royalty must 
bathe somewhere, and German princes don't care 
overmuch for the French resorts. The large Kur- 
saal — the German influence is strong here — a large 
concert hall, built out over the water, is a place where 
one may listen to the world's finest summer orchestra 
and partake of light refreshments. 

Just as an experience, a round of Ostende is amus- 
ing enough, though the passing traveller usually 
knows it only as one of the termini of a particularly 



284 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

unpleasant crossing of the Channel from England to 
the Continent. 

Scheveningen being Dutch is a bit heavy and staid. 
Its peculiarity, at first glance, is the vast spawn of 
mushroom wicker chairs dotting the sands from the 
edge of the green-grey North Sea to the dykes which 
separate its waters from low-lying Holland to the 
rear. These chairs, like the bathing machines at 
Ostende, are rented for long or short periods, and 
such of the throng as do not find enjoyment in the 
rather glacial waters off-shore, are very comfortable 
indeed gazing at those who do from the depths of 
one of the curious chairs, wherein one is so sheltered 
from the winds that blow and the sun that burns, 
that they are otherwise quite indifferent to climatic 
conditions. 

Scheveningen is the seaside suburb of Holland's 
dainty capital of the Hague. There are hotels at 
Scheveningen of an excellence approaching the best 
elsewhere; there is a Kursaal, too, of some magnifi- 
cence, and an appreciably good orchestra. At the 
other end of the dyke is the fishermen's village, where 
the clumsy, broad-of-beam fishing-boats are drawn up 
on the beach, and tarry old salts group themselves 
picturesquely about the market place, where the day's 
catch is sold off by the " Dutch Auction " process, 
which is nothing more than beginning at the highest 
probable price that the fish might bring, with a de- 
scent down the scale if there are no offers at the 
higher prices. 

At Scheveningen one's bathing-box is catered to by 



CITIES OF PLEASURE 



285 



women, who go about, their arms full of towels and 
costumes for rent, each labelled with their name to 
facilitate sorting out. 

The charge for the bath cabin here is twenty cents 
for a small one and fifty cents for one more commo- 
dious, while the rate for the mushroom basket chairs 
and a foot stool is twenty cents a day. 

Across the heart of France, through vine-clad Bur- 
gundy and gripping the foothills of the Alps, one 




/Tbe PALRNQUINS of AlX-L£S-BfllNS 



comes to Aix-les-Bains, which has the reputation of 
being the wickedest place in Europe. Rival spas 
may or may not have set this gossip afloat, but one 
thing is certain; it sets the liveliest pace of any 
" cure " in Europe, and assuredly is not for that class 
of invalids which is in need of rest and quiet. 

Its " cure " is a three weeks' course of baths, 
douches and the usual routine which eases the pangs 
of gout, but the service of palanquins is an exclusive 
feature of Aix-les-Bains. The invalids are carried 



286 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

to and from the baths in a sort of curtained sedan 
chair by two uniformed bearers. One can step from 
bed into a palanquin at any unusual hour that a bath 
is prescribed, be carried to the bathing establishment 
and returned with a minimum of exertion. Automo- 
biles are more plentiful than palanquins though, and 
a very small proportion of invalids form a part of 
the crowds that fill the magnificent hotels for the four 
months' season. 

One is thus tempted to believe that Aix's grand 
thermal establishment is only a drawing card for 
the world which must be attracted thither, and that 
the health bogey is as good an excuse as any other; 
to claim to be able to put one's health to rights in 
three weeks, under the most luxurious of environ- 
ments, is a good enough bait with which to catch 
the most sceptical. 

Vichy has got Aix-les-Bains very close when it 
comes to the purveying of amusements and mineral 
waters, though Vichy's thirty millions of bottles sent 
out into the world each year have left its rival far 
behind. There is no question but that Vichy is 
to-day the less fashionable resort, though perhaps 
visited the more largely. 

The usual attributes of a French watering-place 
are on their biggest scale here. The springs are 
State owned and controlled, and since there is no 
" Vichy " save the " Hopital,'' " Grand Grille " and 
" Celestins," it is needless to order " French Vichy," 
if that which has a right to the name is what is 
wanted. 



CITIES OF PLEASURE 287 

Madame de Sevigne first gave the vogue to 
" Vichy "; since her day the wave of popularity has 
engulfed it as it has no other place of its class in 
France. The Hotel Astoria, the Ambassadeurs and 
the Pare are as luxuriously fitted as those more ex- 
pensive and more fashionable elsewhere, and though 
not cheap are decidedly good value. 

A curious thing about the life of Vichy is that 
you pay for your baths on a sliding scale which more 
or less corresponds with the price which you pay for 
accommodations at your hotel. There seems reason 
in this. 

Americans do not linger on at Vichy, but it is 
worthy of remark that one thousand five hundred of 
the species were registered at this most popular of 
French springs in the month of August of last year. 

Switzerland's resorts take on one complexion in 
summer and another in winter. Some of us who 
know prefer them in winter. 

Lucerne, of all other Swiss towns, heads the list 
as a stranger's capital. It has come forward remark- 
ably in the last few years, though it has not, however, 
the thin excuse for being that has many another place 
of its class; there are no baths, nor tours to take; 
pure enjoyment is Lucerne's only invested capital, 
and its two magnificent hotels, the Schweitzerhof and 
the Luzernerhof, provide the luxurious living which 
is its natural accompaniment. 

Amusements are plentiful enough, and Lucerne is 
the gateway for automobiles coming down from the 
Rhine country and the Black Forest, bound Italywards 



288 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

via the St. Gothard Pass and vice versa. One can 
buy a season ticket and ride about the Lake oi the 
Four Cantons on the line steamers which are forever 
fussing about, as often and as much as one likes, for 
a very small sum. luncheon on board if desired. 

The only practical passenger-carrying airship yet 
launched soars above Lucerne, and for two hundred 
francs — forty dollars — one may take a homeopathic 
flight out over the lake and back to the landing-place, 
if one puts so low a valuation upon one's life. 

Lucerne's greatest amusement is the daily prome- 
nade along the tree-shaded quay, when all the middle 
and upper society of all nations, in the brightest and 
best of summer frocks, takes its airing between the 
hours of tea and dinner. 

Lucerne being about the centre of civilised Europe 
lends itself naturally as a meeting-place, and its 
August crowd is cosmopolitan almost beyond belief 
to one who has not had acquaintance therewith. 

At the tea hour the M lounges " and " halls " of 
the big hotels are full to overflowing. Motor 
launches on the lake are seemingly innumerable, and 
the funiculmrs, up the Rigi or Pilatus, lose themselves 
above the clouds. 

For the woman visitor there is always the diversion 
of the lace and embroider)- shops, for Lucerne is one 
oi the most important of retail outlets for the wares 
of St. Gall and Appenzell. As a drawing card the 
little embroideresses sit stitching away outside the 
lace shops. They serve somewhat naively their un- 
acknowledged purpose of drawing customers inside. 



CITIES OF PLEASURE 289 

though in reality they may be considered as the taffy 
which draws the unsuspecting fly thither. 

The Riviera quartette, Cannes, Nice, Monte Carlo 
and Menton, is the most attractive battery of Euro- 
pean resorts indexed in the books of the globe-trotter. 
They are woman's paradise. One hundred and fifty 
miles of sea coast, from Marseilles to the Italian 
frontier, contains all that is superlative among the 
world's playgrounds. 

This quartette of " stations d'hiver," as the French 
name their winter resorts, are unequalled among the 
world's cities of pleasure. The original development 
of this strip of Mediterranean coast line as a refuge 
for invalids fleeing from the foggy north has been 
lost sight of in a flood of amusements, which has of 
late rolled upon its shores, almost too strenuous for 
those halfway ill. 

Americans have almost appropriated the region 
as their own, and whereas the aspect was formerly, 
and thoroughly, English, to-day it has decidedly the 
flavour of over the Atlantic. American trade is 
catered to by hotels, shops, automobile garages and 
tourist agencies. 

There are no Baedeker " sights " here, not suffi- 
cient to account for the throngs. What antiquities 
there are are discreetly in the background, and sight- 
seeing is not a procedure which is allowed to interfere 
with more frivolous social functions. 

Coming eastward, Cannes is the first of these winter 
stations, the most exclusive, most aristocratic resort 
in Europe. And in spite of this, Americans have 



2go THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

been known to say that it was " too quiet." This 
means simply, if it means anything, that the real life 
of Cannes is not for the outsider. It is a life of 
villas, select clubs, exclusive hotel and restaurant din- 
ners, teas at Rumplemeyer's, the "high life" of 
yachtsmen and women and the things that Russian 
Grand Dukes, German Princes and English Lords 
affect when they are holiday-making under congenial 
skies. 

Here the aristocracy of Europe is at close range. 
As diversions there are golfing, automobiling, yacht- 
ing, polo playing and aeroplaning. Cannes is the 
biggest and most famous yacht station on the Medi- 
terranean, and the swellest craft of all nations that 
fly a flag are, at one time or another, to be seen 
moored to the Albert Edward Jetty, named for that 
great sportsman, Edward VII. 

There is a five kilometre palm-tree-lined prome- 
nade, more attractive even than the celebrated Prom- 
enade des Anglais at Nice, and in the Allees, be- 
fore the Municipal Casino, all the world saunters 
before and after the hour of tea, to see and to be 
seen. 

For the small sum of one franc you may gamble 
at a homeopathic roulette wheel within the casino, 
or for ten dollars dine in the gorgeous restaurant 
of the establishment overlooking the blue Mediterra- 
nean waves, while at Rumplemeyer's one gets ices, 
cakes and tea at equally inflated prices. 

Automobiles of the nobility and royalty of Europe 
are everywhere, but they carry no identifying number 



CITIES OF PLEASURE 291 

plates like those of plebeians ; with a regal right they 
make what speed they will by a sort of international 
courtesy which grants them this privilege of the road. 

All the way eastward from Cannes, across the 
Italian frontier, even unto Genoa, is a whole string 
of these pleasure cities, where white marble structures 
and palm-tree-lined promenades predominate. The 
worldly capital of them all is Nice. 

" Nizza, la Bella," as the Italians called it when 
it was their own, caters for a quarter of a million 
strangers in a season which extends from November 
to May. A busy city on its own account, the tourists' 
capital in winter adds another population of like 
proportions, and there is a " movement " and a 
prosperity which is only to be admitted by acknowl- 
edging that the caring for the stranger is its chief 
industry. 

One reason for the great popularity of Nice is that 
it is within a half-hour's ride of that restricted little 
metropolis of Monte Carlo. A wave of the same 
worldly atmosphere as that at Monte Carlo also 
envelopes Nice, and when its winter population is 
not sauntering in gay clothes on the celebrated Prom- 
enade des Anglais, it is at the Casino, where, for a 
franc entrance fee, considerably less if you are a 
" subscriber," you may spend as much or as little 
as you will and need not feel that you are missing 
anything by not being at Monte Carlo itself. . 

A sort of glorified glass-house, or conservatory, 
Nice's Casino is virtually an indoor palm garden. 
Little wicker tables and chairs are set about tempt- 



2Q2 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

ingly, and one falls naturally before them, and orders 
tea and toast or a " quart Vichy," or whatever one's 
favourite tipple may be for the moment, meanwhile 
listening to the orchestra and gazing at the marching 
and counter-marching throng who make this part of 
their daily round as much a feature of their existence 
as getting up and going to bed. 

In chapel-like alcoves down either side of this great 
glass-domed room is worshipped the God of Chance. 




" Roulette " and " Boule " and " Petits Chevaux " 
here divide the claims for attention, the latter being 
by far the favourite, thought it does seem childish to 
see grown men and women occupy themselves so in- 
tently on little tin horses whirling around on a central 
pivot, in the hope that the one which is painted red, 
or green, or blue, will stop nearest the winning post. 
Like Monte Carlo's game, the odds are very much 
against the player. 



CITIES OF PLEASURE 293 

What Nice lacks in refinement it makes up in a 
generous display of the things that attract and amuse 
the winter idler, and with that one cannot find fault. 
All is luxurious and expensive, but not one single 
phase is exclusive. Money is the open sesame 
to all. 

The shops of Nice will not prove the least potent 
of the lodestones of this winter capital by the sea. 
Chiefly, they are branches of those of the Rue de la 
Paix and the Rue Royal at Paris, and the doors of 
many blazon names the most famous in the world of 
the luxurious shopper. Prices for really exclusive 
things, whether they be jewels, gowns or hats, if 
bought at Nice are apt to be a little in excess of what 
they would be in Paris. The game is one of money 
again, and nothing is good value for what one pays in 
Nice. A large part of one's expenditures here are 
only properly to be charged off to unpremeditated 
follies, but often these are worth paying for, or 
thought to be, so not every one will complain. There 
is no difficulty at Nice in supplying one's most peculiar 
pet taste. 

The little principality of Monaco, with an area 
scarce four and a half by one and a half miles, placed 
like a jewel in the centre of the chain of Riviera re- 
sorts, enjoys the unique distinction of being a land 
whose interests are entirely devoted to amusement. 
The reigning monarch, the army, church and muni- 
cipal government are virtually maintained by returns 
gained from the gambling concession, which itself is 
supported by contributions from all the world. On 



294 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

this foundation the princely house of Grimaldi is 
built. 

That it is the most beautiful spot in the world 
carries small weight beside the fact that the roulette 
wheel of Monte Carlo's Casino is the whirling mag- 
net that draws uncounted numbers to these parts. 
Even the most puritanical of women will want at 
least to " see the inside " of Monte Carlo's Casino, 
and this one may do without male escort. It would 
seem as though it ought to be easy to walk freely 
into an establishment that exists only for the express 
purpose of relieving visitors of their money, but the 
formalities of the procedure here actually take fifteen 
or twenty minutes. At the entrance is drawn up an 
army of officials, imperturbable but watchful. You 
are turned into a businesslike office — more officials. 
Before a long desk, as if you were going to open an 
account in a bank rather than deplete one, a clerk 
asks for some means of identification — a visiting card 
is sufficient — demands your home address and as to 
where you may be stopping. 

All this he records minutely, and during the process 
you have been subjected to a piercing scrutiny. 

No girl under eighteen may enter, so if one's looks 
are too youthful, or her skirts too short, she may have 
some difficulty in convincing the administration that 
she has reached the age of discretion. So, too, if 
you are just off your automobile, and happen to be 
too much wrapped up in a cloud of veiling, you may 
be politely asked to unwrap. All this means that 
the officials wish to have every sure means at hand 



CITIES OF PLEASURE 295 

of identification in case the suicide of an unknown 
takes place in some secluded spot in their beautiful 
gardens. 

At last you are handed a properly made out en- 
trance card. If you have a camera it must be 
checked. Minions in unobtrusive uniforms haunt 
your steps, and you sense the unpleasant feeling of 
being watched. At the entrance to the Salles de Jeu 
you are stopped again, while another official scruti- 
nises your card, finally throwing open the door and 
ushering you within as if it were your appearance 
at some private function. Once inside, your move- 
ments are no longer hampered. You may stroll 
about through the long suites of rooms, from the 
five-franc roulette tables to the twenty-franc trente-et- 
quarante, as you please. Hundreds are crowded 
around each table, but there is a silence as of the 
tomb. People stick rows deep around the golden 
piles on the green baize as flies about a lump of sugar, 
unconscious of all around them but the clink of coin 
and the rustle of banknotes. 

Where money is thrown about on a green cloth 
unceasingly it is only natural that one loses all sense 
of its value. Prices at Monte Carlo bear no relation 
to others elsewhere for the same thing. The res- 
taurant menus scorn to name prices, and the unitiated 
will not know if lunch at the Cafe de Paris is going 
to cost two dollars or ten dollars. A room and bath 
at the Hotel de Paris is apparently anything, in the 
height of the spring season, that the proprietor can 
get — say from ten dollars up. A sojourn at Monte 



296 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

Carlo is a millionaire's game, even if one never goes 
inside the Casino. 

The last of the great French Riviera stations is 
Menton. In many respects it is the pleasantest of all 
at which to make a stay. The virtual gateway to 
Italy, it commands the French Riviera on one side 
and that of Liguria on the other. Its accommoda- 
tions are quite the equal of the other resorts, but 
the atmosphere is more tranquil and the pace slower. 
A scarce half-dozen miles from Monte Carlo, Men- 
ton offers all that that little world of iniquity lacks, 
an English church and a homeopathic druggist. 




CLASSIFICATION OF EUROPEAN HOTELS 

PICTURESQUE ENGLISH INN 

SENTIMENTAL ASSOCIATIONS 

ENGLISH HOTEL " MANAGERESS " 

" LIGHTS AND ATTENDANCE " 

ROSES AND LAVENDER 

COFFEE ROOM 

FOOD OF THE ENGLISH INN 

THE " COUNTY HOTEL " 

AIRING THE BEDS 

SPORT AND THE ENGLISH INN 

HOTEL OF THE FRENCH COUNTRYSIDE 

REAL FRENCH CUISINE 

PROPRIETOR-CHEF 

" COMMIS VOYAGEURS " AND THE TABLE D'HOTE 

EARLY HOURS OF THE FRENCH COUNTRYSIDE 

TYPES OF FRENCH HOTELS 

ITALIAN ALBERGO 

MENU OF THE ITALIAN HOTEL 

COUNTRY HOTELS OF SWITZERLAND 

CHEAP SWISS HOTELS AND GERMAN STUDENTS 

GERMAN GASTHAUS 

INNS OF THE BLACK FOREST 

BREAKFAST AT THE DUTCH HOTEL 

CHEAP HOTELS OF BELGIUM 



XII 

THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 

The hotels of Europe are readily classified. There 
is the purely resort hotel, which is only open at 
certain seasons, catering to a special clientele, and 
whose prices, on account of the various divertise- 
ments purveyed, are well in the neighbourhood of 
ten dollars a day. Tourist hotels of a similar rank, 
so far as excellence and worth may go, but less 
fashionable, cater in a similar fashion for, say five 
dollars a day all found, save the cost of wine or 
extras. 

The frankly second-class tourist hotels of the re- 
sorts, as good perhaps in quality, but less luxurious 
than those of the first class, are much cheaper, cater- 
ing at a minimum of three dollars per day per person. 

Those of the third class, quite good enough, if 
price is a consideration, begin at the equivalent of 
two dollars, and such are found in practically all 
the resorts of Europe, though partaking very little 
of the complexion of those of the first two classes. 

Without going down in scale, but of a different 
classification, are the commercial hotels of the towns 
of France in particular, which possess almost nothing 
of luxury, but often cater in a superior " National" 
manner to those establishments whose clients are 

299 



300 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

English-speaking people alone. On the Continent 
many of these are to be found, where, for seldom 
more than two dollars per day, one may be served 
of the very best that the country affords in the way 
of the good things of the table; in England the cost 
is somewhat more. Such houses may lack in what 
we call modern conveniences, but invariably possess 
a character which many will prefer to that of the 
tourist establishments where only " foreigners " are 
found. 

Last of all comes the country inn, lowest in price, 
and, on the Continent, often to be had for a dollar 
a day, or a little more, up to say a dollar and a half. 
In such quaint and charming hostelries as these usu- 
ally prove to be, one is sure of simple, well-cooked 
food, abundantly served, and the opportunity of 
rubbing elbows with the people of the country 
is not the least of their attractions. Under such 
conditions, deficiencies and inconveniences are made 
light of, and one gets a touch of individuality 
which vividly impresses the surroundings upon 
one. 

The American traveller accepts without question 
the English inn as the ideal type of the small hostelry, 
but regards dubiously the corresponding small hotel 
of the countryside of Continental Europe. Even if 
one does sample the modest Italian albergo, the Ger- 
man gasthaus or the small French anberge out of 
curiosity, and finds it good, the experience is looked 
upon as an exception. More particularly is this the 
woman's point of view, and still unconvinced, she 



THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 301 

passes on the next time to the big tourist hotel with 
a thousand windows. 

The reason is obvious. The English inn has been 
thoroughly advertised by the time-honoured literature 
of its country. Poets and artists, times without num- 
ber, have surrounded it with a romantic glamour, 
so that now it stands as the very flower of the 
traveller's rest-house. 

Since we as a nation have largely drawn our ideas 
of hotel life from English sources, it is correspond- 
ingly through that same medium that we have im- 
bibed the English contempt of the " foreign" hotel 
— meaning that of Continental Europe. But this 
point of view is giving way before the immense im- 
provement in all classes of hotels, brought about by 
the Renaissance of tourisme that is sweeping over 
Europe. More especially is the change to be noted 
in the small country hotel of France, which the Eng- 
lish themselves are forced to admit as superior, in 
many cases, to their own country inns, if not in 
actual comfort, at least in quality, and this ought to 
mean the same thing. 

It is the English inn which still makes the strongest 
sentimental appeal to the traveller. It still stands 
for the glamour of the open road and a real hos- 
pitality of a pertinent, personal nature. The Eng- 
lish inn is synonomous with good cheer and comfort 
and a welcome still warm with the traditions of old- 
time travel. It is the personal service with which 
one meets at the English inn that makes the strongest 
bid for the woman traveller. No matter how small 



302 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

the house, one is taken in hand and made to feel 
as much at home as is possible when one is sleeping 
in a strange bed and being waited upon by strange 
servants. 

That the English inn is still our ideal of the most 
attractive form of hostelry, is endorsed by the imita- 
tions which are springing up all over our own coun- 
try. Just the display of that magic word " inn " is 
enough to assure one that patronises the establishment 
behind it of comfort, quality and high prices, though 
with this latter, it ought not to be. It is easy thus 
to see that the picturesquely disposed inn holds its 
own in the affections of the American, and why it is 
not the least of England's charms for the tourist. 
The sentimental call of the country inn to the traveller 
who wants picturesqueness as well as solid comforts 
is irresistible. One does pay though for its pictur- 
esque accessories, more perhaps than is really justi- 
fiable. The English inn is often an illustration of 
the costliness of simplicity, for the smallest of thatch- 
roofed country inns is frequently a big surprise in 
the matter of prices. 

Twelve shillings a day is about the price for meals 
and lodging in the inn of the average big town in 
England. This seems a trifle stiff for going to bed 
by a solitary candle and also being charged for it 
in the bill. It is not only inconvenient to go to bed 
by a candle, but galling in the extreme to be made 
to pay for the privilege, and this archaic custom for 
paying for " light and attendance " still holds good 
in most English hotels, the exceptions being certain 



THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 303 

of the newer ones in London. The charge varies in 
the country inn from a sixpence to a shilling and 
sixpence, according, as it would seem, to what the 
traffic will stand. 

In most cases it is a woman who presides over 
the destinies of the English inn. The hotel business 
is more nearly a woman's business in England than 
elsewhere. It is the " Manageress " who is to be 
seen in the office of most hotels, both great and small. 
This has much to do with making that " home 
atmosphere " which is peculiarly an attribute of the 
English hotel. The fact that the English carry their 
environment, one might almost say atmosphere, about 
with them as much as possible, is responsible for this 
effort of the hotel proprietor to create what is com- 
monly known a " home from home." This is the 
English idea of hotel life. 

Femininity is the keynote at the little English inn. 
A maid in a neat dress and white apron and cap, 
most likely, carries your hand luggage up to your 
room, often to the great distress of the chivalrous 
American man should he happen to be an adjunct to 
the party. Under such circumstances he has often 
been known to do the porterage himself. 

At its best, the English inn has roses clustering 
about its latticed windows, and the smell of sweet 
clover comes floating in from the meadows below. 
It is delightful to rest between lavender-scented sheets 
in an old-fashioned English inn, and while the first- 
class English bed is the best in the housekeeping 
world, it is more often met with as a combination of 



304 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

a " flock " mattress on top of a featherbed. The 
dressing-table takes up the best window, back to 
the street (the ideal place for it, by the way), and 
white dimity hangings look cool, too cool sometimes 
as one shivers through an English summer, for fires 
in July are not uncommon. The maid brings up hot 
water in a " jug," and for the bath there is a flat 
pie-dish-like, tin tub, unless one has sufficiently 
adopted the custom of the country and travels with 
a collapsible one of rubber, whose tendency is to fold 
up unexpectedly and set the floor awash. 

To get into the real spirit of the thing a guest 
at an English inn should have a cup of tea before 
rising. This the maid will bring up on call, and it 
will not be forgotten in the bill, figuring at from 
sixpence to a shilling, but in spite of this no English 
woman would think of beginning the day without this 
stimulant, and even the mere English man takes 
kindly to the custom. 

The " coffee room " is the general utility room of 
the English inn. Here one writes letters, sits, smokes, 
reads and takes one's meals, but whatever may be 
the disadvantage of dining off of one end of a table 
at which another is writing, the atmosphere of the 
coffee room is comfortably pleasing, and usually its 
furnishings are enough to turn the woman from " out 
West " into a collector if she had not the craze before 
leaving home. The furniture is apt to be old and 
massive and of good periods. On the walls, and on 
the inevitable British sideboard, is generally a dis- 
play of pewter and old English china, long out of 



THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 305 

print, so to speak, and silver or plate of the Sheffield 
variety. No English inn is complete without a glass 
case of stuffed birds or beasts — or it may be fish; 
it all depends upon the sporting tastes of a long line 
of former proprietors, for such accessories are usu- 
ally hand-me-downs. There is not much use to pump 
the proprietor as to the purchase of these relics; 
antiques are well known to be an asset, and for that 
reason alone he will be averse to parting with them, 
if indeed he does not wish to keep them for senti- 
mental reasons. 

At the more pretentious inn a waiter of the old 
type is sure to be in attendance in the " coffee room "; 
solemn, with mutton-chop whiskers, a fast disappear- 
ing type of the old-time servitor. 

Breakfast costs what one wishes to pay for it. 
Coffee (though it is well to stick to tea in Britain), 
bacon and eggs, marmalade and toast are the staples. 
The toast will be cold, though this will not be 
through mistake but by intent, for it has stood in the 
toast-rack unbuttered, as is the wholesome way, to 
cool off. The cost may be two shillings, or it may 
rise to the city price of " two and six," more famil- 
iarly reckoned as half a crown. At times it may 
drop to one and nine pence or some such uncouth 
figure, but not often. On the sideboard are arranged, 
in that class of inn that owns to the solemn waiter, a 
varied assortment of those cold " joints " that so 
appeal to the Britisher as a breakfast dish. Thus, 
with a slice of cold 'am or mutton or a " bit of fish," 
the price will certainly reach the highest limit. 



306 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

Dinner at the country inn is the midday meal, and 
the bill of fare is as monotonous as a tax receipt — 
chiefly boiled mutton, potatoes, cabbage and one of 
the solid English varieties of pudding, that under 
different names bear a strong family resemblance. 

There are little towns where, if one happens in on 
market day, such a meal can be had for a shilling, 
accompanied with a glass of temperance ale at 
tu' pence, but the more usual price will be two shillings 
and six pence, the half-crown being the most popular 
and hard-worked coin in the realm. 

Supper at night is practically what you can get. 
" Whatever you like, ma'am," is only a formula in 
the mouth of the solemn waiter or the neat maid, and 
soon reduces itself to a chop or a bit of cold meat 
left from the dinner's " joint," and, if you are late, 
and the village butcher shop happens to be closed, 
not even the chop will be forthcoming. More often 
than not it is cold meat and cheese combined into a 
" high-tea " with the help of the ever good English 
brew, at a cost of eighteen pence or a couple of shil- 
lings. The bill of fare of the English inn is very 
inelastic and is apt to cool the enthusiasm of the 
American traveller brought up on a great variety of 
food. One does get used to it, but there is always a 
longing for something different. 

The automobile has been a missionary to the inn 
in England, and is directly responsible for the 
Renaissance of the country post-house, whose vogue 
had greatly declined with the passing of the old 
coaching days. The increased prices of the new era 




I On 4Be Cote &E/77er>ai/c>-N0RMAND 



THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 307 

are sometimes extortionate for the return one gets, 
and have soared until the picturesque inn of the small 
town is often as expensive as the more ambitious 
" county " hotel of the larger communities. 

There is always a " county " hotel in each county 
town. It is an establishment which is supposed to 
be patronised by the swell element of neighbouring 
country houses when perforce they have to remain 
in town. Here the bill of the stranger will fluctuate 
between twelve and twenty shillings a day, especially 
if the proprietor is ambitious enough to attempt to 
get you up an evening meal sufficiently pretentious 
to be called a dinner. 

Happily the rule of the old coaching days, " four 
bottles of port to four horses," does not have to be 
imitated by the owner of a 60 H.P. touring car, but 
one pays in other ways for the privilege of being 
treated as a " gentleman," which, according to the 
tradition of the British innkeeper, is that you must 
be served, as nearly as possible, in the manner in 
which you are supposed to live at home. You also 
pay for this in the bill. 

If one will not expect too much from the food and 
is not looking for modern conveniences, the English 
inn will serve one very well. In winter the cosy 
coffee room of an English inn is a most attractive 
spot as one comes in out of a November fog and 
huddles around the blaze of an open fire, the tea 
kettle singing on the hob, while the maid is hurried off 
to " air the beds," — damp sheets are the bogie of 
the English housekeeper, and the opening up and 



308 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

warming of the bed amounts almost to a religious 
ceremony in the humid little isle. What a pleasant 
antidote this is for the chills outside ! In some inns 
that hold to old customs, the long-handled, brass 
warming-pan, filled with glowing coals, is still passed 
under the bed coverings in an effort to dry them out 
before the guest retires. In England one can often 
vary a stay at some quaint little riverside inn, if there 
is a desire to sample the fishing, for the proprietor 
usually has manorial rights which cover the taking of 
fish for a mile or two along the stream. You can 
hire a rod, a small boy and a boat and be lucky 
enough, perhaps, to bring back a trout or a pike for 
dinner. In any of the great hunting 'shires one can 
hire a mount at the local inn and follow the hounds 
of a famous hunt, a free and democratic amusement 
open to all under certain conditions. If a good golf 
links is in proximity to a comfortable inn an ideal 
combination is made for one who would like to take 
his, or her, pleasures quietly. All these things are 
possible to the stranger once welcomed under the 
hospitable roof of the English inn. 

The English inn has long overshadowed its coun- 
terpart on the Continent, but the small French country 
hotel is coming into its own, largely through the 
Touring Club de France, which has done great work 
in improving the French hotel of all grades. Espe- 
cially has the small hotel of the countryside benefited 
under its tutelage in the past ten years, and even if 
it has not always risen to the height of installing 
the chambres hygieniques, advocated by the beneficent 



THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 309 

T.C.F., the whole tone and aspect of things has been 
put on a more livable basis, while those cabalistic 
letters " W.C.," opposite the name of a hotel in the 
hotel guide of the T.C.F., indicate improved san- 
itary arrangements of a kind that scarcely existed a 
few years ago. 

The country hotel or auberge of France (the word 
inn does not lit in for the nomenclature of a small 
French hostelry) has quite as much charm on inti- 
mate acquaintance as its counterpart in Britain, 
though its exterior is often plain, and, at first glance, 
unattractive. For all this the lone woman traveller 
may drop into any French countryside hotel, no mat- 
ter how humble it may appear, with perfect confi- 
dence and propriety, and be assured of finding a 
good bed, good cooking, good food and reasonable 
prices. 

However you may arrive at the French hotel, by 
the hotel 'bus from the station, by the omnibus of the 
ville, or in your own automobile, you will most fre- 
quently drive into the courtyard — sometimes a gar- 
den, but more often paved with cobblestones, with 
the stables lined up on one side. The expectant 
garcon rings the big bell that hangs beside the en- 
trance and the patron comes to the door to welcome 
you; as likely he is the chef, too, in white apron and 
cap; the proprietor is usually the chef himself in the 
country hotel in France, in which case you may count 
upon it that the food will be good. The rooms may 
seem bare after the plethora of furniture of the 
English inn, but its warm, waxed floors, as in the 



310 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

north, or the glazed tiles of the south, are more 
hygienic than the carpets under foot that the English 
insist upon at home. The bedroom is as severe as 
a convent cell, and the bed resembles a sarcophagus, 
piled so high with many mattresses that it takes a 
gymnastic turn to get in. The sheets are of linen, 
sometimes old, hand-woven heirlooms of fascinating 
softness, sometimes unbleached and of a board-like 
thickness. The frugal French housekeeper counts 
on the life of a sheet being a quarter of a century 
and buys sturdy stuff. 

The washing arrangements are usually microscopic, 
and the bathroom non-existent. A demand for hot 
water meets with but slow response, but this is only 
because the kitchen fire has to be made up and a 
casserole or broc of water heated. The man cham- 
bermaid one must put up with; there is no reason for 
getting shocked over it, he takes it all as a matter 
of course, so why should not you. There will be 
only a solitary candle for light in the bedroom, in spite 
of the fact that most country hotels in France have 
electric lights on the ground floor. On a table in the 
hall is ranged a long row of candles in shining brass 
candlesticks, which you set aglow from the little 
night lamp — a wick set in a cork, floating, lighted, in 
a receptacle of colza oil, or by the more dangerous 
expedient of a cotton swab dipped in alcohol, being 
first lighted at a whale-oil lamp. Matches are quite 
as much of a luxury in France as hot water. 

There will be no sitting-room, rarely a reading- 
room, smoking-room or the like. The cafe, attached 



THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 311 

to the hotel or located nearby, supplies all these 
wants. For the woman traveller the French hotel 
lacks many things, but this arises from the fact that 
Frenchwomen as a class travel only on rare occa- 
sions, and seldom for pleasure. 

It is quite possible that you will be the only woman 
at the long table in the salle a manger, but do not 
let that disconcert you, for though there is a long 
line of commis-voy agenrs , or commercial travellers, 
down either side, the chances are that they will not 
so much as waver an eyelid in your direction. The 
provincial European — the Frenchman in particular — 
when occupied with his dinner preserves an Oriental 
oblivion to the presence of woman; he makes a seri- 
ous business of eating (the objectionable quality be- 
ing that he does so noisily), and he is not easily 
diverted from this purpose, not even to stare at the 
unchaperoned American girl. The commis-voyageur 
has his uses; when in doubt as to the choice of a hotel, 
follow the French commercial traveller and his brass- 
bound trunks, for he picks out the best cuisine as 
unerringly as a divining rod points to hidden 
water. 

The dinner will be excellent, of a quality far 
superior to that of the usual tourist hotel, and it is 
to French hotels of this class that one must go for 
typical French food. It is not the cooking of Paris, 
which, with all its excellence, is monotonous. 
Throughout France each petit pays has its special 
dishes, and, the French being patriotic above all else, 
it is but natural that the proprietor should take pride 



312 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

in setting before his guests the plats which are cele- 
brated in the neighbourhood. 

Dejeuner and dinner are always on the table d'hote 
plan; even in the most modest village hotels they are 
always meals of ceremony, of from six to eight 
courses, dejeuner being the more pretentious of the 
two. There is only one complaint to be made of such 
bountiful and uniformly good meals; it is that the 
two are too much alike in variety and quantity, 
dejeuner differs from dinner only in the omission of 
soup and the inclusion of cheese. 

In the cider country of Normandy and Brittany 
carafes of golden cider are included at each meal; 
elsewhere the wine of the country — white or red, as 
may be the most plentiful cru of the region — are 
served ad lib, or at least, a discretion, without extra 
charge. 

After-dinner coffee must be sought at the cafe, 
never far away from the hotel, perhaps even located 
under the same roof. Early hours are the rule in a 
small French town, and by ten o'clock the great portal 
of the hotel is locked up tight. More than one 
automobilist has had to sleep in his car under the 
windows of a wished-for hotel in France because no 
one would be disturbed to let him in, though he 
tooted his horn like the last trump. The French 
landlord is not so keen to corral the stranger and his 
purse as his Teuton, Swiss or Italian neighbours 
across the Alps, so that it is well to arrive early at 
one's stopping-place for the night. 

Some of the most interesting of small French 



THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 313 

hotels are those of Normandy and the valley of the 
Seine. Old Norman timbered hostelries with medi- 
aeval facades, garden courtyards and waxed floors 
are at their best in towns like Les Andelys and 
Louviers. 

Out in Brittany, the westernmost point of France, 
the passing tourist is less frequent than elsewhere; 




it is, furthermore, the poorest part of France, and 
for these two reasons the country hotels are not up 
to the standard of appointments and cookery of the 
best of French traditions. 

Across mid-France, from Paris south to Lyons, and 
from the Bay of Biscay to the Alps, are found the 



3H THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

best provincial hotels of Europe, with the vraie 
cuisine Francaise. 

In the region of the Pyrenees the country hotel is 
all that it should be, and often highly modernised in 
some respects because of the radiating influence of a 




chain of watering places which stretches out prac- 
tically the whole length of the Franco-Spanish 
frontier. 

Along the Mediterranean coast one finds the worst 
class of purely country hotels in France. It is not 
that they can be termed bad, but it is certain that the 
hotels of the Midi lay themselves open to criticism. 



THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 315 

It is the influence of the Southern temperament that 
is prone to take life easy. A lack of water is every- 
where noticeable, and the tiled floors seem cheerless, 
after the waxed parquets of the north, while the 
cuisine of garlic and olive oil is distasteful to many. 
Thus it is that an otherwise fascinating country suf- 
fers through the deficiencies of its hotels, and until the 
Riviera is reached, with its great hotels catering 
largely to foreigners, and which for the most part 
are nothing French at all, the hotels of southeastern 
France are by no means to be classed with the many 
good things that are French. 

The small Italian albergo, or the more humble 
trattoria, has not the endearing qualities of the Eng- 
lish inn, nor of the French country hotel. It may 
have far more picturesqueness, it might once have 
been a palace or a convent where one may even dine 
in the old cloister, or it may possess a crumbling 
marble loggia, or a classic garden with a carven 
fountain and much battered sculpture, but it rarely 
inspires one with the desire to end a wandering, ex- 
cept to gain a brief respite from a strenuous exist- 
ence as a tourist. Things are casual, in Italy at the 
best, and in the countryside one gets the lack of order 
and method, unsoftened by any modernity. The 
comfort that even the most modest English inn pro- 
vides is entirely lacking. The country hotel of Italy 
is like Italy as a whole, delightful to see and to add 
to one's recollections of experiences, but hardly suit- 
able for making oneself at home and settling down. 

The people add not a little to the restlessness that 



316 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

pervades the Italian country hotel. They are charm- 
ingly bright, and greet one with a spontaneity and 
genuine pleasure that is most agreeable, but stranger 
people who wander about the world for pleasure only 
are never ceasing objects of curiosity, and when one 
leaves the beaten track the scrutiny and unceasing 
attention that one gets becomes tiresome, no matter 
how good-natured and well meant they may be. 
These attentions are met on all sides, from willing 
but incompetent hotel help, from the loafers in the 
village, from every one. It is not ill-natured, but 
annoying, sometimes even embarrassing. 

The word cosy, or even comfortable, cannot be 
applied to the Italian albergo. As a rule it is bare 
and gaunt, with stone or marble floors, no place to 
sit, not even a cafe attachment as in France. The 
Italians have not the cafe habit except in the cities and 
big towns. 

There is no swinging inn sign in Italy. A little 
shrine beside the entrance, holding a statue of the 
madonna, takes the place of it, or it may be that there 
is a sacred picture frescoed on the wall with a swing- 
ing lamp before it. Invariably, across the facade, 
in bold, black letters, will be blazoned the name of 
the hotel. 

One must do in Italy what is never done in France 
or England — bargain for prices, not so much for the 
reason that there is danger of extortion, though there 
is a tendency everywhere in Italy to advance prices 
to English-speaking people, as from the fact that 
there are no fixed charges. The proprietor of a little 



THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 317 



roadside albergo often does not know what to give 
one, in other words, how much one is willing to pay 
and what would be considered a proper equivalent. 
On such a basis of reckoning it is natural that the 
traveller is obliged to help him out. 

Usually there is no table d'hote, or tavola rotunda, 
in the Italian hotel of any grade, but the highest usu- 
ally serves meals a la carte, although sometimes there 
may be a luncheon or midday meal which one can 
order as a whole, or from which one may select only a 
dish or two. Often you wander into the kitchen and 
see for yourself what is forthcoming in the way of 
food. The great stone-flagged room seems full of 
people, relatives of various degrees and ages, with a 
grandmother or two 
hovering over a cop- 
per brazier of char- 
coal if the weather be 
cold. 

In Italy it is al- 
ways safe to ask for a 
veal cutlet and some 
form of past'i — maca- 
roni, tagliatelli, spa- 
ghetti or what not, and 
this with a long, thin- 
necked bottle of Chianti and Gorgonzola cheese 
makes as ample and excellent an Italian meal as can 
be got, and ought not to cost over a franc and a half. 

The sleeping-room of the humble Italian albergo 
usually has a portrait of Garibaldi and chromos of 




318 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

the reigning royal family on the walls. One's bed 
is made up after arrival, which is not a bad custom. 
The washing outfit is precariously hung on an iron 
stand that suggest a jardiniere, and is of tin. A chair 
or two and a small rug about completes the furnish- 
ings. On each window ledge is a flat, red cushion, 
which is convenient for following the Italian fashion 
and spending your spare moments hanging out of 
the window, the cushion thus protecting your elbows. 

In spite of a look of general disorder, things are 
actually clean enough, and while in sanitary necessities 
the small Italian hotel is primitive, Italy all around is 
improving in this respect, and is perhaps no more 
backward than many other parts of Europe. 

The Italian hotel of the towns is fully a third 
dearer than the French establishment of the same 
grade. A dejeuner that in France usually costs two 
francs, fifty centimes, in Italy becomes three, and 
even four. There are some five, six and seven lire 
a day Italian hotels to be found in many places, which 
tourists rush on top speed, but the general impression 
that Italy is cheap does not hold good when com- 
pared with what one pays for the same sort of thing 
in France. 

The trail of the tourist is over most things Swiss, 
but there are good, genuine country hotels in Switzer- 
land, patronised principally by Swiss tourists. The 
Swiss really do tour their own country, and do it 
economically, by foot or on bicycle, leaving it for the 
visitors to support the big hotels. It is on a walk- 
ing tour that one comes across these little hotels in 



THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 319 

villages that have no too well advertised mountain 
background to draw the summer rabble. One type 
is a square, low, two-storied building, with a top- 
heavy roof of weather-stained brown tiles and solid 
wood green shutters to the windows and a big brass 
handle on the door. It stands on the village square, 
the church to one side with a big tree shading the 
door, against which lean a half-dozen bicycles. It 
is neat, plain and attractive, and though perhaps 
within sight of a great fashionable resort its inclusive 
prices hover between five and seven francs a day. 

The food is a bit monotonous and there is always 
an odour of string beans and pork in the air. This 
is a dish that can be counted upon with almost daily 
regularity. The universal Swiss breakfast of coffee, 
rolls and honey is apt to be the most agreeable meal 
of the day. Barley soup is another staple that loses 
its value by repetition. The truth is, Swiss cooking 
is not good, but there is always milk and the real 
Swiss cheese of Gruyere, and, as a last resort, the 
cheap and nourishing milk chocolate with which to fill 
in any deficiencies. 

It is possible to get a pension rate at a Swiss coun- 
try inn for five francs a day, and be comfortable and 
well-cared for, but this would be in one of the little 
villages on some of the high plateaux, such as the 
pastoral country where the Gruyere cheese comes 
from, one of the most charming, unspoiled corners of 
Switzerland. It may happen though that the little 
rural inn may refuse to take you in during the haying 
season on account of a scarcity of help. The pro- 



320 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

prietress will shake her head and say how sorry she 
is, but servants, family and everybody have had to 
stop work to gather in the hay, which, next to tour- 
ists, is Switzerland's main source of revenue. 

If one will browse around the larger Swiss cities 
there are modest hotels to be found hidden away in 
tiny squares, patronised by country people who still 
wear the stilted coiffes and laced bodices with plas- 




trons of clanking chains, the insignia of some far 
off mountain canton. Walking parties of German 
students, who do Switzerland on the closest margin 
of all tourists, find these places out readily enough. 
A room for a franc or a franc and a half, dinner for 
but little more and supper for a little less, brings the 
round figure to something less than a dollar. Such 



THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 321 



a hotel may be a picturesque old Gothic house, dating 
from the fifteenth century, the windows bright with 
growing plants. Everything will be clean, for this is 
not the least of the 
virtues of the Swiss, 
and while the meals 
will be what the 
French call unsympa- 
thetic they will likely 
enough be eaten in 
company with a party 
of gay young folk on 
their way down from 
a week's climb over 
some mountain pass, 
with their alpenstocks 
and their Tyrolean 
hats wreathed with 
Alpine wild flowers, 
the girls with nail- 
shod boots, sweaters 
and knee-length skirts, who, like their male com- 
panions, are loaded down en tour with heavy ruck- 
sacks strapped over their shoulders. 

The prevailing characteristics of Swiss inns are 
German. So much is this so that the same conditions 
are met with in the small inn of the Bavarian High- 
lands and in the picturesque Black Forest. 

The German country hotel is not so pliable as 
those of other countries in adapting itself to the 
stranger. A lone woman on a tour of exploration 







322 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

will find less geniality here. Germany, however, is 
making a big bid for the American tourist, and the de- 
sire to attract American dollars their way is spread- 
ing to the countryside from the cities and watering 
places. 

Nothing can be more picturesque than the German 
gasthaus, with its ornate swinging sign, its front cov- 
ered with half-defaced paintings, scrolls, dragons and 
flowers, with the name writ large in decorative Ger- 
man script. 

You go to bed in a lofty chamber, chilly even in 
midsummer — stone flags form the flooring — and you 
need the fat featherbed which is the coverlid in order 
to keep warm. The bed is vast and fully four feet 
from the floor, and the heavy linen sheets feel clammy 
to the touch. The big porcelain stove of blue tiles 
blocks up an entire corner, and coffee and rye 
bread is your breakfast. German food is good on 
the whole, if one likes cold meats and a variety of 
excellent salads, stewed fruit with duck and, of course, 
sauerkraut and sausages of all lengths. 

There is nothing lightsome about the speiskarte of 
the small German hotel. An unprejudiced, travelled 
German will tell you that there is nothing in Ger- 
many so good as the country hotel of France, though 
he himself may appreciate German food and the 
manner of its cooking far more. The mark being 
valued at twenty-five per cent more than the franc, 
prices, too, in Germany are higher than in France, 
Switzerland or even Italy. 

The country gasthaus of the Black Forest does not 



THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 323 

usually get a big tourist clientele, but if one wants to 
get in touch with the life of picturesque Germany — 
where legends are still a topic of conversation and 
there still exists a belief in fairies — in contrast with 
the rapacity that has filled the valley of the Rhine 
with factory chimneys, they will do well to lay out 
some Black Forest inns on their itinerary. 

Their architecture is much the same as is seen in 
the peasant homes of Switzerland, of the Bavarian 
highlands and of the Austrian Tyrol. A low-spread- 




ing gable forms a frontage which is broken with 
rows of narrow windows, and the stables are usually 
found under the same roof. In the public room, 
partly a sitting-room and partly a drinking hall, the 
walls are of a blackened wainscoting, and one sits 
on a carved oak bench with a high back before a 
table as massive as a monument. 

The proprietor usually serves himself. He wears 
a skullcap of embroidered velvet, home-knit grey 
stockings, knee trousers and an apron. He smokes a 
pipe that might have been handed down from his 
ancestors with the house, and his manners are brusque 



324 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

and independent, though for all this he is sincere and 
will not overcharge. He and his family run the 
hotel with the help of an extra girl or two from 
the village. Women servants are the rule outside 
the larger towns, for the business is too poorly paid 
to attract men. The maids clatter about in high- 
heeled wooden shoes, in the ugly dress of the women 
of the Black Forest, woolen skirts to the knees, a 
laced bodice over a white chemisette and a stiff wire 
coiffe of black or coloured ribbons. 

On Sundays one can study local conditions, if one 
can stand the smoke, in the big room. Here the 
peasant folk meet and dance and eat and drink coffee 
and beer. The fun is boisterous, and sometimes dis- 
turbs the live stock, as there is only a half partition 
between the stables and the apartment. 

Holland has the most expensive small hotels and 
Belgium the cheapest in the comparative European 
scale, but the country hotel of the land of big wind- 
mills and small houses gives the biggest breakfast 
of any. 

You enter the dining-room of a real Dutch hotel 
and find the long table set out with various Dutch 
cheeses, an assortment of Dutch sausages, brown 
bread, white bread, sweet rolls and excellent coffee — 
which is spoiled by the serving with cold milk. The 
Dutch hotel proprietor after all gives you something 
for your money, and all the other meals beneath his 
roof are in proportion. 

In Belgium one gets on the trail of the table 
d'hote again. The French influence is paramount 



THE COUNTRY HOTELS OF EUROPE 325 



here, but with a slightly German flavour to things, 
beer taking the place of wine at table. The beer, 
however, is included in the price of the meal, and 
at from five to eight francs a day, Belgium, one of 
the cheapest but one of the wealthiest countries of 
Europe, cares for one very well indeed. 

Those two old Flemish cities, Bruges and Ghent, 
have long been favourite summer places for the Eng- 
lish who want a cheaper holiday than that afforded 
by many places in their own country. Dollar-a-day 
rates were once not uncommon and are still to be had, 
but too much popularity 
has had a tendency to boost 
prices. 

The American woman 
doing Europe will have to 
become more of a hardy 
traveller than the average 
before she will want to 
rough it in the countryside 
of Spain. The old custom 
of carrying one's food 
about with them to be 
cooked at the particular 
place at which they might arrive for the night is 
giving way to the more precarious method of depend- 
ing on the supplies of the primitive fonda, which at 
its best, in the large towns, is often not bad, but which 
is awful in the country. 

The hotels of the larger Spanish towns are con- 
stantly improving— there is a " Ritz " even at 




Tn C^+aloni2 



326 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

Madrid. Often the small Spanish hotel begins on 
the second floor, to which you arrive by entering 
through a courtyard filled with country carts and 
mules, finally mounting a long stairway to the hotel 
proper. You just order " dinner," without specify- 
ing what, and you get a good meal at four or five 
pesetas. You raise your eyebrows over the bill, but 
it is your own fault. You could have ordered half 
of the bountiful meal for half the price if you had 
known. In hotels, as in life, most of our troubles 
come as the result of not knowing. 







s£-£ 



HOTEL AN AMUSEMENT ENTERPRISE 

CHAINS OF GREAT TOURIST HOTELS 

COSMOPOLITAN CLIENTELE 

WOMAN'S INFLUENCE ON EUROPEAN HOTELS 

EXCLUSIVENESS OF THE FOREIGN HOTEL 

GERMANS THE BEST HOTELIERS 

GERMAN-SWISS METHODS 

HOTEL AMUSEMENTS 

MUSIC A DRAWING CARD 

HOTELS AS PEACEMAKERS 

CATERING FOR ALL NATIONS 

BATHS AND " LIFTS " 

CHARM OF ALL THINGS FRENCH 

FRENCH HOTEL PROPRIETOR 

INDIVIDUALITY THE KEYNOTE IN FRANCE 

ENGLISH HOTELS 

SCOTCH " HYDROS " 

" GRAND AND PALACE " HOTELS 

ROYALTY AS AN ADVERTISEMENT 

PARIS A CITY OF SMALL HOTELS 

MODERN HOTELS OF PARIS 

USEFUL TERMINUS HOTELS 

A HOTEL OF THE SAHARA 

HOTELS OF BISKRA 

EGYPT AND ITS MODERN HOTELS 



XIII 

WOMAN AND THE EUROPEAN HOTEL 

The great modern hotels of Europe differ funda- 
mentally from the same thing in America in being 
primarily great amusement enterprises. Their com- 
mercialism is subordinated always to entertainment 
of a pleasure-making kind, and their edifices have been 
designed especially for the demands of society en 
tour, as well with regard to luxury as a divertisement. 

There are chains of these big tourist hotels, such 
as the Bertolini establishments, the Ritz's, the Carl- 
ton's, the Gordon's and the like, as well as combina- 
tions that do not openly proclaim their allied identity 
under one name. 

The object of founding hotels in series is that they 
may be planted around so as to catch the same 
clientele in the different stages of its journeyings. 
The policy of their owners is to pass a client along 
from one affiliated establishment to another, and by 
this well-thought-out scheme the traveller can do a 
large part of Europe, and some of Africa, under the 
same hotel management, if ingenious and planful, and 
if the enterprise, in its various branches, was success- 
ful in the first instance in making the right impression. 
This is a combination that works to the advantage of 
both the hotel and the guest. 

329 



33Q THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

The season for most of the big hotels is limited; 
it would be impossible for such to run continuously 
at the high pressure of comfort and service demanded 
for one short season of but two or three months, 
as is often the case. The resourceful European 
hotelier, beside whom his American confrere is in the 
Kindergarten class when it comes to the science of 
tourisme, simply transfers his staff from his summer 
hotel in the Alps to his palm-shaded winter house 
on the Mediterranean, and baits it with the same 
attractions, when, sooner or later, the same school 
of patrons comes nibbling along. This pleases nearly 
everybody, for the reason that a large majority want 
their amusement purveyed to them with a minimum 
of effort. 

The cosmopolitan type of hotel simplifies the lan- 
guage difficulty also. It is in a position to stand 
between its patrons of many lands and the friction 
which might arise by their coming in contact with a 
strange tongue in a " foreign " hotel. So intimate 
has become the function of the great hotel that to 
visit one or another is like going from one big house- 
party to another. Friends arrange to meet at the 
same hotel whilst travelling, and congenial parties 
link up with one another as they go from some 
11 Grand " hotel to some " Palace " hotel, whether 
at the Golden Horn, Gibraltar, Cairo or Copenhagen. 

The woman tourist is largely responsible for the 
present status of the great hotel of Europe, if not, 
in many cases, for its actual being. To a large extent 
many have been designed for woman's convenience 



WOMAN AND THE EUROPEAN HOTEL 331 

and pleasure. Their salons and corridors are prac- 
tically the show-rooms for the creations of the dress- 
makers and milliners of London, Paris and New 
York. Members of the elite society of the four 
quarters of the world are but mannikins who exhibit 
and advertise the wares of those who have fashioned 
their charms. All the resources of one's wardrobe 
are taxed to meet the dress parade of the great 
Europeon resort hotel. This is not absolutely neces- 
sary, but the custom is growing every year more com- 
plicated, and larger supplies of luggage are needed 
than ever before if one would make the tour of the 
Grand Hotel in commensurate style. 

The English demand comfort, but the American 
goes farther and demands luxury, and to the Amer- 
ican woman may be given much of the credit for the 
luxe that the modern European hotel proprietor is 
showering upon his guests. 

The foreign hotel is designed first of all for attrac- 
tiveness and for comfort, in spite of the fact that it 
is lacking in many of the mechanical conveniences of 
America, though these are replaced by a highly 
trained and efficient staff of servants which is always 
on hand to render personal service with an outwardly 
polite respect. This is a very soothing state of 
affairs after an experience in a Broadway restaurant 
with a bootblack from the basement who has been 
elevated to the position of a waiter on the first 
floor. 

The entrance hall is always a lounging place, called 
appropriately in England, " the Lounge." Then 



332 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

there is the highly ornamental salon, perhaps two, and 
a reading-room — the salon de lecture of the Con- 
tinent — where the world's leading newspapers and 
pictorial magazines are to be found. The more am- 
bitious hotels of this class will have an attractive 
courtyard, often masquerading as a palm garden, a 
pleasing and useful adjunct to any town or country 
hotel. 

The foreign hotel invariably insists upon a certain 
air of exclusiveness. In this lies its charm. The 
public is not allowed the free use of the European 
hotel, wearing out its furniture and using up its 
stationery, as in liberal America. One cannot get by 
the watchful porter at the door without a definite 
object which potentially tends to benefit the hotel. 
Things are figured on too close a margin on the other 
side to permit of the free and public use of hotel 
privileges. 

It is in this class of hotel that the individual pro- 
prietor has given way to a syndicate with a Directeur 
as a go-between. What is gained in comfort has 
been lost in those elements of a personal character 
which old travellers loved. The average hotel of 
to-day is on too big a scale to be influenced by per- 
sonality; the stockholders in the syndicate want only 
dividends, and all that the average guest wants is to 
be able to travel with the smallest amount of ex- 
pended energy and friction, caring nothing at all as 
to whether it is a German, an Italian or a Swiss 
who may be caterer. The disadvantage of such a 
hotel regime is that one's impressions of a country 




?mci 



¥ 








"■'JkiMCtseA<P 1 w*wt«s 






Hotel Garden — Montreux 



WOMAN AND THE EUROPEAN HOTEL 333 

often come through foreign out-of-focus lenses, 
rather than from a national viewpoint. 

The German, or the German-Swiss, is perhaps the 
best all round hotelier of to-day. It is he who has 
put the modern European hotel on the business foot- 
ing that it has acquired in the last decade. Take 
those famous modern houses of Berlin as concrete 
examples and deny this if you can. This sphere of 
influence stretches from the farthest Bohemian spa to 
the Pyramids. The best managed, cleanest, most 
nearly perfect type of machine-made hotel of Europe 
to-day is under German influence, even though its 
name be writ in Italian, French or English, or in a 
combination of all three. Wherever modern methods 
of hotel sanitation and comfort are to be found the 
trail of the German will be found close by. 

Many hotels in Italy are run under German aegis, 
perhaps even backed by German capital, and while 
the Swiss " Hotel Director " is a type peculiar to 
himself, he, too, is chiefly German in his methods and 
in his attitude towards the traveller, and though he 
does things more parsimoniously than the German, 
who knows that liberality is the best divertisement 
a hotel can have, he scrupulously keeps to his sched- 
ule aiid handles expeditiously the Baedecker brigade 
that uses the Alps as a bridge across Europe. 

The Germans have gone the English one better; 
besides putting out one's shoes in front of the bedroom 
door at night, there is also a hanger for one's clothes, 
so that they may be ready at hand for brushing by the 
valet who creeps about in the still hours. The cor» 



334 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

ridors of some modern German hotels look like cloak- 
rooms or storage vaults. Less trusting hotels have 
lockers beside the door for the same purpose. The 
idea is not a bad one, though garments have been 
known to get mixed up at the hands of a sleepy 
valet de chambre, resulting in the breaking up of a 
harmonious party and much scandalised whispering 
over afternoon teacups. 

The Germans, too, are responsible for the univer- 
sal introduction of music as a feature of hotel and 
restaurant life. Nothing cements a crowd of people 
so much as music, nor contributes so much of that 
atmosphere of gaiety so carefully cultivated by the 
great hotel. Tyrolean singers carol in the electrically 
lighted hotel gardens of French resorts like Vichy 
and Aix-les-Bains; theatrically attired Neapolitan 
boatmen warble " Santa Lucia " to amuse the guests 
of an immense hotel on a snow-crowned Alpine sum- 
mit, and singers of all nations chant in all keys to 
the well-fed, after-dinner crowd over coffee cups at 
Trouville in summer, and at Monte Carlo in winter. 

The European resort hotel has every device for 
nailing the crowd to the spot and making it too 
contented to move on. It must be confessed that 
the ingenuity of the hotelier is taxed to the utmost 
to hold the restless American already blase, if only 
by his financial ability to get what is wanted, at the 
time it is wanted and in the desired proportions. 

One does not have to go outside of a hotel of this 
class for anything. There may be a vaudeville per- 
formance in the salon, a palmist may have the con- 



WOMAN AND THE EUROPEAN HOTEL 335 

cession to read for you, at a high price, a cheerful 
future in a cosy corner of the " Lounge," and there 
are convenient booths scattered about the corridors, 
where souvenirs of any country are put in easy reach 
of this great floating hotel population, of course at 
enhanced prices. 

The great foreign hotel is perhaps making for the 
world's peace quite as much as the Congress of the 
Hague. By its means nations are brought into social 
contact and, more or less, are becoming tolerant of 
each other's peculiarities, at least more conversant 
with them. The " Grand " and " Palace " hotels, 
carrying out their policy of being all things to all 
men — more especially to all women — are aiding the 
cause far more than one might at first admit. 

The holiday season is used to advantage by the 
progressive Continental hotel with a foreign clientele. 
A German Christmas tree is set up in the drawing- 
room, and frequently costly gifts are distributed to 
a crowd of grown-ups as pleased as children. Eng- 
lish plum pudding has become an international Christ- 
mas dish and is impartially put on the menus for 
English and Americans alike. The American cock- 
tail, in its mild European form, is eagerly sought 
affe€r at the so-called American bars which are usually 
found in most big hotels. Altogether one is quite 
sure of not being allowed to forget his nationality. 

The English afternoon tea custom has become 
standardised, and everybody looks forward to the 
dainty service of tea, along correct lines, in the 
11 Lounge," or the " Llall," where the ladies may 



336 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

smoke if they choose, for woman's cigarette has got 
beyond the stage of intimate boudoir use in Europe. 
Under such surroundings guests fall into cliques 
readily enough, and what with going off on excursions 
together, sooner or later make plans to move en 
masse to the latest palatial establishment lying on 
their paths which may have been recommended to 
them by others gone before. 

The social game has largely superseded the trav- 
eller's one-time single devotion to relics of the past. 
What is demanded now by the clients of the 
"Grand" hotel is all that is modern and modish. 
The growing American clientele is making its in- 
fluence felt. It has insisted on elevators and bath- 
rooms, with modern fitments, and while the English 
were the pioneers in improving sanitary conditions 
on the Continent, they were content to carry around 
their bathtubs with them. This is not possible with 
a party of six or a dozen Americans who arrive at a 
big hotel by automobile, hence the demand of each 
for a private bath overtaxes the capacity of most 
hotels, or did, up to within a very few years. The 
hotelier finally woke up, and now great hotels, every 
room with its bath, are going up on all the well worn 
trails trod by Americans " doing Europe." 

The hotel elevator in Europe is appropriately 
called a " lift," for very often its only function is 
to take you up, leaving you to find your way down 
the stairs. Any other procedure would seem a waste 
of mechanical energy, which costs money to produce, 
in the eyes of the frugal foreigner. The usual 



WOMAN AND THE EUROPEAN HOTEL 337 

" lift " is about as large as a bird cage, and moves 
with a slowness that gives the passengers an oppor- 
tunity to get acquainted before the third floor is 
reached. One variety of the " lift " is manoeuvred 
from below, and, to the embarrassment of the lone 




woman traveller she may often find herself sent off 
at a snail's pace as the only occupant of a " lift," 
bound on a journey to the top. Again she may be 
shut up in a box-like cage with an unknown man 
and scarce enough extra space about them to allow 
of unrestricted breathing. 

Hotel keepers of all nationalities, by the frequent 



338 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

custom of giving a French name to their hotel, pay a 
compliment to the charm that all that is French ex- 
ercises on the imagination, and, by the almost uni- 
versal adoption of a French cuisine and menu, tacitly 
acknowledge the superiority of that nation in the art 
of good cooking. The word " hotel " has been in- 
corporated into every language; in Italy it is as well 
known as the native .albergo; in Spain as the fonda 
or in Germany as the gasthaus. 

Curiously enough the Frenchman himself has been 
the slowest of all in catering for the outside tourist. 
It is in France, too, that the hotel proprietor himself 
is most in evidence about the establishment; he has 
not been so eager to turn himself into a stock com- 
pany, being a creature of traditions, of much personal 
pride, and content with smaller profits. 

Even such touristised hotels as are found in the 
great French resorts, such as Trouville, Evian-les- 
Bains, Aix-les-Bains and Vichy, the hotels are purely 
French in all their functions. With the exception of 
a few parasitical excresences which have been forced 
upon him, the genuine French hotelier never meets 
innovations even halfway. He is independent to a 
marked degree, but while he will not take so much 
trouble as will the German-Swiss personage of his 
class to appease the whims of his guests, neither is he 
so commercial, not to say rapacious. He sees to it first 
of all that his cuisine and wines are of the traditional 
best, and gives himself little concern as to whether 
the installation of his salle-de-bains is of the latest 
pattern or not. 



WOMAN AND THE EUROPEAN HOTEL 339 

" Oh, I send these exigent foreigners to the big 
house over the way — every room with a bath," said 
the proprietor of a hotel on the French Riviera, hav- 
ing exclusively a high-class French clientele, with a 
shrug of the shoulders. " Four bathrooms are 
enough for my people." He used to think that these 
folk from across the seas were mad until they de- 
veloped this water craze. 

The English, who have been, until recently, preju- 
diced against the mixed hotel amusement idea, have 
now taken up with it heartily. This is proven by the 
number of luxuriously appointed hotels, on a much 
more magnificent scale than ever before, which are 
opening up all over the British isles, the direct result 
of tourists arriving by automobile, whereas before 
they arrived scarcely at all. 

Evidences of the workings of a big English hotel 
are kept out of sight as much as possible. What 
there is of an office is unobtrusively tucked away in a 
corner of the entrance hall, which might be that of a 
private house. A log fire burns in the big open fire- 
place (an almost daily necessity the year round in 
some parts of Britain), and tea tables are set about 
here and there that at five o'clock every one may 
forgather for tea and a social chat before dressing 
for dinner. At some of these establishments private 
mounts are kept in the stables, and women guests may 
go for a morning's canter over the downs or along 
the sea-front, as if they were sheltered in some 
friend's country house, wearing that curious com- 
bination, a riding habit and a straw sailor hat. 



340 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

Dinner is always a function, with decollete full-dress, 
after which coffee is drunk in the " Lounge," while 
the band plays discreetly, hid behind imitation palms 
or rubber plants, and the inevitable card parties begin 
to form themselves. 

This habit of seeking pleasure at hotels, due, it is 
claimed, to the influx of American ideas, has done 
much to break down English exclusiveness. Hotel 
acquaintances are now as much sought as they were 
once shunned. It is avowedly for social life that 
large numbers of English people put in their holidays 
and week-ends at the hotel that purveys the most 
amusement for the price charged, though often they 
use the disguise of curative baths or waters in the 
neighbourhood to account for their prolonged absence 
from town. 

There are, in Scotland, " shooting," " fishing," 
" golfing " and " hydropathic " hotels, which are dis- 
tinctly Scotch. At the latter one may indulge the 
bathing habit to heart's content, hot or cold, douche 
or spray, warranted to cure any ailment. " Hydros," 
once so popular, are fashionable no longer, though 
their prices are high and they welcome any kind of 
traveller, whether excessive bathing is to be a part 
of their daily life or not. 

Temperance hotels are another purely British in- 
stitution, and are what their name implies, places 
where nothing more exciting than ginger-pop and 
bottled lemonade is served to drink. They are, for 
this reason, supposed to be peculiarly suited to the 
demands of a feminine clientele. 



WOMAN AND THE EUROPEAN HOTEL 341 

That there is something in a name may be deduced 
from the general custom of making use of the prefix 
" Grand " or " Palace " before the name of many a 
great hotel; sometimes as a sort of super-emphasis, 
both words are made use of, and there are supposedly 
intelligent people who will refuse to go to a hotel 
that is not so labelled. 

The word " Grand " has been so overworked that 
it has really lost its significance. The simplest hos- 
telry can get the local sign-painter to put " Grand" 
before its after name, but even extreme local egotism 
naturally shrinks from the responsibility implied by 
putting the word " Palace " over its front door, where 
the courtyard shelters more country carts than auto- 
mobiles. 

It may be safely counted upon that the " Palace " 
hotel, of whatever combination of words may be the 
rest of its name, tries to live up to its pretensions. 
Often, in Italy, it is a genuine palace that has been 
converted to the uses of a guest house, to the financial 
profit of the present owner, and a tickling of the 
sentiments of the tourist. There is no doubt but that 
the sentiment that is supposed to exist in sunny Italy 
is largely supplied by the imagination of the visitor. 

To show the length to which a hotel will go in 
cadging for business, one Italian hotel advertises that 
the use of garlic is absolutely banished from its 
kitchen. The refined olfactory nerves of the cultured 
foreigner are not likely to be offended beneath that 
roof. 

The modern hotel on the Continent makes use of 



342 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

royalty wherever possible as an advertisement and 
drawing-card. The credit of this is due to the 
Italians. In a conspicuous place, near the entrance 
of many an Italian hotel, may be seen a card which 
states that His or Her Gracious Majesty has hon- 
oured the hotel at one time or another by occupying 
one of its suites of rooms or breaking fast therein. 
The enthusiastic American girl at once demands that 
the royalties be trotted out for inspection, and is 
chagrined to find out that it was long years ago that 
they passed that way. By paying a hundred per 
cent above the usual charges one may have the privi- 
lege of occupying the same rooms, and usually they 
do not want for takers. The acknowledgment of 
such a distinction by an Italian hotel is as much of 
an influential trademark as are the royal arms over 
the shop front of a London tradesman. 

Paris is a city of small hotels. The hotels of 
Paris have a fascination for the visitor which in a 
way is inexplicable. They are chic; there is no doubt 
about that — some of them, with a certain Parisian 
atmosphere — but actually, until very recent years, they 
have been most backward in that modernity which 
an indulgent generation demands. 

With the coming of the Elysee Palace Hotel and 
the Regina a few years since, and the making over 
of the Grand, the Continental and the Meurice, a 
certain revolution in Paris hotels took place, until 
now, even with the staid old Athenee, and the still 
more staid and exclusive Bristol (the abode of roy- 
alty, which only within the last half-dozen years 



WOMAN AND THE EUROPEAN HOTEL 343 

has installed the modern bathroom with " hot and 
cold laid on," as its habitual and favoured clientele 
expresses it) , these only are to be reckoned as in the 
very front rank. 

Prices at these Paris caravansaries are anything one 
likes to pay; the more so this if one demands that 
which she has been used to in New York, Boston, 
Philadelphia or Chicago. This, as goes without say- 
ing, means a room with a bath. For this one pays 
the transatlantic tariff and something more. There 
is nothing cheap about the Paris hotel. 

Recently has come along a new crop of hotels like 
the Astoria and the Crillon, new, some of them, as 
to their structure, whilst others are new only in their 
appointments. They are no better nor no worse than 
others of their kind elsewhere, and prices about the 
same. The hotel with modern comforts in Paris 
can hardly be expected to supply a room and bath 
at less than fifteen to twenty francs a day, and it 
may be fifty or more. You can beat it on Broad- 
way. 

Something in the Paris hotel line, with a real reason 
for being, has sprung up recently in the quarters 
just off the rush and bustle of the boulevards. There 
is the Louvois, on the Square Louvois opposite the 
Bibliotheque Nationale, in a little backwater of tran- 
quility, but scarce a stone's throw from the Avenue 
de l'Opera. The latest is the Hotel Lutetia, on the 
Rive Gauche, near the Bon Marche, to which the 
same applies. Modern, unpretentious, exceedingly 
convenient and in every way first class, if not fash- 



344 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

ionable, Paris hotels of this nature are bound to be 
more numerous. Their prices, of course, are some- 
what less than would be charged for an apartment 
as comfortable and convenient in one of the great 
palatial hotels with mondain reputations. 

Another class of hotels which in Paris, and indeed 
in London and in some other European cities, serve 




the lone travelling woman in a manner which she 
will greatly appreciate, are the Terminus Hotels, as 
those affiliated with the great railway companies are 
known. The best examples in Paris are the Termi- 
nus Hotel at the Gare Saint Lazare, and that of 
the Gare d'Orleans — the Terminus Quai d'Orsay. 
At Marseilles, too, and at Lyons, the P. L. M. rail- 
way furnishes accommodation of a similar nature 



WOMAN AND THE EUROPEAN HOTEL 345 

for the traveller, and in many respects it serves better 
than any other. 

Leaving Europe and crossing to Africa, one still 
finds French influence paramount. In the French 
department of Algeria, and the virtually French pro- 
tected Tunisia, that French trilogy — good hotels, 
good cafes and good roads— go together. Down 
even into the Saharan desert one finds hotels as truly 
French as if they were in the midst of one of the 
old French provinces instead of on the edge of an 
African oasis. 

The Hotel des Ziban at Biskra is such an example. 
There is a big syndicate-owned hotel at Biskra, along 
with a few others — the Royal Palace, something or 
other — but nothing that compares in local colour with 
the Ziban. Here one comes into contact with curious 
contrasts of West and East. One sips French drinks 
under an Eastern colonnade or in the palm-tree- 
shaded courtyard, in as cosmopolitan a company as 
one may find out of Cairo or Constantinople. 

Three generations of an old French family preside 
over the destinies of the Ziban. Gathered there 
among the company on one occasion was an Arab 
Caid and his family, making their way south for the 
winter to their tribal town hundreds of kilometres 
farther on in the burning sands. They took up 
their journey again one morning at three o'clock, 
and with a retinue of forty men and as many camels 
stole off as stealthily and romantically as if they 
had not come down from the coast, where they 
had spent the summer, by the same puffy little 



346 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

train which brought ourselves from the sea to the 
Sahara. 

There was also a Belgian automobile party which 
was motoring " Farthest South " at a considerable 
cost in rubber tires; there was a French army officer 
and his bride on their honeymoon; a Russian artist 
painting the coloured squalor of old Biskra; a party 
of French blue-jackets on their curious mission of 
digging wells for a desert army post; one of the 
11 White Fathers " of that order of Monks which has 
carried the Cross into the Sahara — this particularly 
worldly one was not averse to relaxing with the rest 
when the heat drove every one to iced drinks, ice 
being more readily obtainable in the Sahara than in 
many an Alpine mountain town of Dauphiny or 
Savoy. Among the flower beds of the courtyard 
gamboled two brown-eyed gazelles, and no end of 
Arab servants slipped about like ghosts in white robes 
and heelless slippers, while an army of native guides 
squatted at the street entrance, biding the sight-seeing 
caprices of the guests, most of whom were fully 
charged with the sentiment of " Beni-Moro " on 
arriving. 

One ate genuine French food, tinged with a spicing 
of Arab pepper and herbs, in a dining-room so dark- 
ened, to keep out the hundred degrees of heat, 
that you had to feel your way. Mosquitoes buzzed 
cheerily all night, and the guests went shopping, be- 
fore retiring, in Biskra's Bazaar, searching for some- 
thing that would temporarily act as mosquito netting. 

" Mon Dieu, c'est impossible," said the French 



WOMAN AND THE EUROPEAN HOTEL 347 

grandmother, knitting away on a stocking, as she had 
been doing since her girlhood in the mountains of 
Auvergne, and slapping an occasional buzzer. " But 
then the mosquitoes never go above the ground floor; 
you will be all right once in bed." 

In Africa, as in New Jersey, there is this same 
mental obliqueness as to mosquitoes. 

There are fireplaces in all Biskra hotels; even the 
grandmother admitted that they might be needed in 
winter. And she said further, " You Americans and 
the English will have them when you come down in 
February and March." 

For eight francs or so a day one can live at the 
Hotel des Ziban, while twenty-five would be the bot- 
tom limit at a Royal or a " Palace," where the guest 
follows the same routine of teas and card parties 
(interspersed with such exotic amusements as can 
be had from visiting the dance halls of the Ouled 
Nails) as at Davos in Switzerland or Pau in the 
Pyrenees. 

One gets another view of exotic life from the 
orchestra seats on the terrace of Shepheard's Hotel 
overlooking the only original streets of Cairo. 
Shepheard's holds its own among world-famous hos- 
telries, in spite of the more gorgeous and more mod- 
ern big European-like hotels that have sprung into 
social prominence in the neighbourhood since Cairo 
became an international rendezvous for travellers be- 
tween the West and East a half century or more ago. 
As a diversified amusement nothing quite takes the 
place of the " Terrace " at Shepheard's in the height 



348 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

of season, say about February, when the chairs be* 
fore the little wicker tea tables under the gay Oriental 
hangings are all taken, and a crowd, clothed in all 
colours, and of all degrees of celebrity and brilliance, 
is gathered to hear the band play, gossip and watch 



\^ 




the multi-coloured population of this most cosmo- 
politan of Oriental cities drift ceaselessly past. 

One can play tennis and golf now almost the 
length of the lower Nile, and one can live at the 
Mena House Hotel, in the very shadow of the Sphinx 
for six dollars or so a day all found. It is easy to 
have sympathy for the Nationalists, the young Egyp- 
tian party, of this unhappy land, whose slogan is 
" Egypt for the Egyptians." 



WOMAN AND THE EUROPEAN HOTEL 349 

For those who want to go to the fountainhead of 
antiquity with a maximum amount of luxury there is 
nothing better than the hotels of Egypt. They will 
send one out sight-seeing in an automobile with a 
gorgeous silk-clad dragoman beside the chauffeur, and 
though one can't get far out into the desert sand, the 
ten miles to the Pyramids and another ten back is 
an enjoyable and novel excursion. 

One class of European hotel advertises itself as 
an " international tourist resort of the first rank," 
while another puts out printed matter to the effect 
that: "it proposes to keep its entertainment in all 
departments on a level with the enjoyment to be de- 
rived from the majestic scenery around about." Each 
of these methods gives a clear-cut idea of modern 
European hotel management. The big syndicated 
hotels of Europe are practically trusts, and again is 
the American hotel behind; witness the first of these 
combinations which has recently broken in on this side 
of the water, run by one of the most successful of the 
European international companies. 

Perhaps in time all the " Palace " and " Grand " 
hotels of Europe will form themselves into a trust, 
formulate one policy and pool their earnings. This 
would simplify matters, and the average clients would 
be more easily pleased, for in that case there would 
be a greater assurance that the desired continuity of 
that which they found so to their liking would be 
unbroken. The death knell of the small hotel, so 
far as the world-famous cosmopolitan European re- 
sorts are concerned, has been rung. 



j5o THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

For those, however, who like the other phase of 
hotel life, in many a backwater off the restless stream 
of wandering fashion, there still can be found the 
hotel whose proprietor wears the white cap of the 
chef, and where, too, the little cafe with its sawdust- 
strewn floor isn't a bad change sometimes from the 
" Lounge " of the " Grand " hotel. 








INCIDENTAL MEALS 

TEA-SHOPS OF ENGLAND 

TITLES AND TEA-SHOPS 

A PLAIN TEA 

TEA AT THE RIVERSIDE INN 

11 TEAS " IN THE COUNTRY COTTAGE 

HIGH TEA 

AFTERNOON TEA IN THE COUNTRY HOUSE 

SUBSTANTIAL TEAS OF SCOTLAND 

PARIS ADOPTS THE " FIVE O'CLOCK " 

CREAMERIES 

ITALIAN PASTRY SHOPS 

PASTICCARIAS AND DROGHERIAS 

CHOCOLATE AN AID TO TOURING 

LIGHT REFRESHMENT IN SWITZERLAND 

HONEY WITHOUT BEES 

MILK CHOCOLATE 

BEER GARDENS IN GERMANY 

FAMILY PARTIES 

MAKING ONE'S OWN COFFEE 

GERMAN BANDS 

CAFE-RESTAURANTS 

BRASSERIES AND TAVERNES 

RAILWAY REFRESHMENT ROOMS 

LUNCH ON A RHINE STEAMER 

DINING-CARS OF EUROPE 



XIV 

LIGHT REFRESHMENTS 

Incidental meals are particularly attractive to fem- 
inine taste, and seem especially adapted to the needs 
of the woman traveller. A woman seems to dodge 
regular meals. While man will neglect the finest 
sight in Europe to connect with the lunch hour, 
woman, on the other hand, will faithfully finish a 
round of sight-seeing, and depend on foraging for 
some fluffy, unsubstantial food to restore her strength. 

It must be admitted that there is a certain amount 
of fascination, and even convenience, in doing this 
thing; on a small scale, it is the same inspiration as 
that which keeps the explorer ever forging onward, 
and that is exactly what the traveller is, or ought 
to be, to get the maximum of enjoyment out of travel. 

In England the tea-shop offers the solution of the 
light refreshment problem. Afternoon tea is still 
an exotic in American life which is absolutely scorned 
by man, though the American woman adopts the 
habit readily enough when she crosses the water. In 
England a tea-shop is a tea-shop and not a junk- 
shop for the sale of bric-a-brac on the side. 

In London there are many varieties of tea-shop, 
and some of these are legitimate lunch places of a 
kind, though their menu is usually restricted and they 

353 



354 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

are apt to be overcrowded at the conventional tea 
hour. The " Aerated Bread Company's " shops — 
commonly known as the " A. B.C." — and the " Brit- 
ish Tea Table " rooms are virtually developments 
of the " bun-shop " of the Victorian era. Here one 
can get such startling combinations as cold meat pies, 
marmalade, water cress, soft-boiled eggs and a cup 
of tea or coffee. This is an example of what suits 
a certain class of English taste, but one can do much 
better, even in these places, by taking a little pains 
in the composition of their menu. 

As the price goes up the tea-shop grows more 
attractive. The u Kardomah " is a favourite estab- 
lishment, got up in a most attractive style, primarily 
to advertise a particular brand of tea and coffee. 
The company has also a branch in Paris, where the 
tea-drinking habit has caught on among Anglomaniac 
French men and women to a remarkable extent. In 
London all restaurants have their tea hour and all 
hotels their tea rooms, and these are as much patron- 
ised from the outside as by guests of the house. 

In the tea-shops of London's Bond Street, the de 
luxe shopping centre, one can have their tea served 
by impecunious ladies of title who have adopted this 
means of a livelihood. The English know the value 
of a noble prefix as a means of drawing trade. 
Milliners, coal dealers and lunch-room proprietors 
have all tried it, and successfully. 

Prices vary, but the high-water mark for a " tea " 
does not usually rise above a shilling and sixpence, 
about thirty-six cents. This means a pot of tea, 



LIGHT REFRESHMENTS 355 

copious hot water and a liberal supply of the delicious 
thin " cut-bread-and-butter," whose delicate, eco- 
nomical transparency has brought the slicing of it to 
a science. A habitue of the tea table eats the dainty 
slices folded once over. This is a plain tea; if one 
wishes to add cakes, or water cress and cucumber 
sandwiches, and jam, the price goes up by sixpenny 
and shilling leaps, according to the environment in 
which one orders the refreshment. 

Tea, with an accompaniment of plum cake, is a 
dinner spoiler, especially to the American, who usu- 
ally wants to sit down to dinner before seven o'clock, 
but it must be confessed that the stimulating effects 
of afternoon tea as an aid to pleasurable travel are 
invaluable, and besides this, it supplies an element of 
sociability, particularly if partaken of in one of the 
fashionable and popular gathering places. 

In the English countryside the " tea " fulfils its 
highest functions, and becomes the most enjoyable 
meal of the day. What could be more appealing 
than tea in a riverside garden of a little inn on the 
banks of the Thames, or on one of the many soft- 
flowing English rivers, where rosy-cheeked maidens 
bring out the tray and lay the cloth, where one may 
sit and watch the slow-moving punts, row boats and 
launches skimming over the river? 

There is always the same thin " cut-bread-and- 
butter," and it is achieved by no patent knife either. 
One wonders, indeed, how it is done; it must be as 
the result of centuries of training, like the production 
of those wonderful lawns of the English and the 



356 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

smooth, sand-papered effect of the country in general. 

England is dotted all over with the cabalistic 
word — " Teas." " Teas " are quite a source of in- 
come to many a small cottager, who often hangs out 
a modest shingle beside the garden gate which reads: 
" Teas, Sixpence." One rarely goes amiss in trying 
out a " cottage-tea." You enter and pass up the little 
garden walk, between old-fashioned English flowers, 
and bang the knocker on the door. There is noth- 
ing about the little thatch-roofed cottage that sug- 
gests commerce. You are asked into a tiny parlour, 
a bit stuffy because its owner believes keeping out dust 
at the expense of fresh air. 

" Will the lady have jam with her tea? " is asked. 
Sometimes the offer of a soft-boiled egg is made. 
The frugal minded in England push the afternoon 
tea along and turn it into a small supper, thus avoid- 
ing the formality and expense of a late dinner. Such 
a plan works admirably in the country, where the 
local inn usually serves a midday meal. The tea, 
in this case, is supplemented by the soft-boiled egg, 
cold meat and jam, and thus becomes a " high tea," 
thought not so high in price as the average hotel 
meal, not more than eighteen pence or two shillings 
at the most. Of course the " cottage-tea " does not 
always rise to this height, but such is always within 
the scope of the capabilities of the average country 
inn. 

Tea in the English home is a function to be appre- 
ciated. English tea at its best is only to be had in 
the home service. In the great hall before the huge 



LIGHT REFRESHMENTS 



357 



open fireplace on a chill November day in some 
country house, the ceremony attendant upon the serv- 
ing of tea is something to be remembered, as it is on 
a June evening under the great cedars on the lawn. 
It is under such circumstances that one sees in its 
glory the English muffin, the porous, tasty crumpet, 




7b&s4- 



the hot scones and the tea cake. There are a num- 
ber of variations of these delicious, indigestible dain- 
ties, while tea would not be tea without its accom- 
panying plum cake. Tea in Scotland has its own 
accompanying specialties, such as hot, buttered scones 
and shortbread, beside which common pastry is like 
a health food cracker. The Scot needs his sturdy 
digestion ! 

Nowhere does tea seem so good as in England. 
It would be difficult for us to squeeze a fourth meal 
a day into the domestic economy of American life, 



358 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

but in the chilly little island one seems to require this 
in order to finish off the afternoon. The English 
tea room is fast becoming as much of an institution 
on the Continent as the cafe wherever the English 
congregate in large numbers. They have demanded 
it, and so all over Europe, in the large cities, it can 
often be found, and if of any pretensions, it serves 
also toast, scones and plum cake of a standard quite 
up to that found in Britain. 

In Paris there is a nest of tea-shops gathered in 
the neighbourhood of the Rue de Rivoli which are 
the rendezvous of English and Americans alike, and 
where people stand in line waiting to get tables at 
some of the more popular. When they get them 
they pay Paris prices, too, usually far ahead of those 
of London. The Frenchwoman is also to be seen 
here in numbers ; she has taken to the " five o'clock " 
habit, as it is called in France, with great gusto. 
These Paris tea rooms might be called " conversa- 
tional tea rooms," so much do they lend themselves 
to social intercourse between the tourist flotsam and 
jetsam that sooner or later drifts together from all 
over Europe. 

But no matter how delightful the cup of tea is in 
damp, foggy England, the false note for the traveller 
is sounded when the characteristic eating places of 
the country are neglected. It is the little things that 
stamp the individuality of a country on the mind 
of the traveller quite as much as its monuments. 
Food and drink, and the manner of their serving, 
will give one a far clearer insight into the life of a 



LIGHT REFRESHMENTS 359 

people than the mere contemplation of churches and 
palaces. 

All over Paris there abound little cremeries, where 
much the same sort of thing is purveyed as in a 
tea-shop, though in a much simpler manner and at 
lower prices. Things here are very French, which 
is what one wants in France, not imitations of the 
institutions of another country. The cremerie serves 
principally coffee, chocolate, tea and milk, all of 
which will be very good as to quality. In a small 
way some pastry and biscuits are served, sometimes 
eggs, and usually, as a concession to its English and 
American clientele, jam or confiture. 

One of the best attractions that Italy has to offer 
the hurried traveller for refreshment are the wares 
of her pasticcaria. These pastry shops are every- 
where to be met, and their cakes are invariably good. 
The shops are so numerous as to suggest that the 
Italian lives largely on chocolate and cake. Regard- 
less of the time of day, the pasticcaria always seems 
to be doing a rushing business, and more men than 
women make up its list of patrons. 

Go to one of the big establishments in Genoa, 
Florence or Rome of an afternoon and it will be 
found overflowing with a mixture of the tourists of 
all nations, and members of Italian society as well. 
One may see an Italian officer looking like an operatic 
stage tenor in his long, graceful, pale-grey cloak, 
with his family, the women well-dressed, but lacking 
the chic of the Frenchwoman. There will be young 
collegians and young girls chaperoned by their 



360 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

mothers. In the height of season, from February to 
May, one will hear as much English spoken as 
Italian. Scattered about are little cafe tables, where 
a waiter will come to take your order, but it is quite 
the proper thing to wander about, selecting your own 
cake from the varied assortment displayed on long 
tables and counters at the end of the room. The 
variety of these cakes is bewildering. In the con- 
fection of little sweet cakes the Italians lead the 
world. Coffee is usually good, the tea fair to mid- 
dling and the chocolate is served with whipped cream. 
The price of it all depends upon one's capacity for 
sweet things, but a lira should cover the cost of many 
cakes. In most of these Italian pastry shops there is 
something which greatly resembles a bar, from which 
are distributed all manner of drinks; that most largely 
consumed is the sweet, sticky, Italian Vermouth, the 
best brand of which is familiarly called " Cinzano." 
The Italian comes, too, to the pastry shop for his 
before-dinner aperitif, when he usually orders bitters, 
the most popular brand being " Fernet-Branca." 

The Italian pastry shop is found in the most 
unexpected places, often as an attachment of a drug 
store, when it will be labelled " Drogheria e Pastic- 
caria," an ominous conjunction of words. Queer 
places they are, but barring the pastry, they run 
otherwise somewhat parallel to our own drug stores. 
The soda fountain is replaced by rows of bottles of 
sticky, syrupy drinks, and one stands before the 
counter and orders a " Cinzano," or sits down at a 
little table and sips bitters. The Italians declare 



LIGHT REFRESHMENTS 



361 



that Vermouth is an antidote for fever, but in spite 
of this theory the drogheria is as prevalent as the 
pasticcaria, and often combines the functions of the 
two in as appetising a way as possible, the chief 
precaution taken seeming to be that the drugs shall 




not get mixed up with the pastry. You sit at a little 
table and watch the show go on, sipping a cup of 
chocolate, while the young man at the counter at 
your elbow weighs out senna and quinine to another 
client. 

The pasticcaria in Italy is particularly welcome, as 
meals out of hours at hotels are rather uncertain, 
particularly in the countryside trattoria. It is a fact, 
too, that the rolls and coffee that one gets at the 
pasticcaria are usually far and away ahead of those 
of the albergo. 

The fare of the German beer garden is an agree- 
able varient in the food that one eats between hours, 



362 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

though its speiskarte is chiefly cheese and sandwiches. 
Between Italy and Germany comes Switzerland. 
The business-like Swiss restaurant and inn-keepers 
are all things to all classes of travellers, and one 
may run the gamut from the tea-shop, French cafe 
through to the beer garden. Switzerland has, more- 
over, its own style of go-between meals. Nearly 
every panorama of lake and mountain may be en- 
joyed from the vantage point of some little eating 
place, where one sits under a neatly barbered tree 
and eats bread and butter and honey, and milk from 
the cows that graze on the mountains above the 
clouds. Switzerland flows with milk and honey. 
One can see the brown and white cows perched high 
up on the mountain slopes, but one never sees the 
busy bees that supply the golden, sticky, so-called 
honey that is so lavishly ladled out. This very 
lavishness on the part of the economic Swiss is of 
itself suspicious. The little waitress of the Ober- 
land, garbed in a black aureole coiffe and a breast- 
plate of clanking, silver chains, once gave away the 
receipt: " Oh, no; it's not honey; it's made of sugar 
and glucose and something else; I have forgot just 
what, madame." It may have been the honey that 
was forgotten, for there is undoubtedly little of the 
bee-made taste about the concoction. However, the 
glorious mountain air counteracts any bad effects, and 
one is not critical or over-fastidious of their food 
with such a panorama as that of the Alps in view. 

Prices rise with the altitude in the Alps, the cost 
of living depending largely upon the difficulty of 



LIGHT REFRESHMENTS 



363 



transporting food up and down mountain roads. 
From one to two francs ought, though, to buy a 
little Swiss luncheon, which will be served on the 
red and white checkerboard tablecloth that one usu- 
ally sees in a Swiss or German restaurant — the pat- 
tern sometimes varies, but the colour scheme rarely. 
Under German influence light refreshments take 
on a more substantial aspect. Whatever may be the 




^mttaasra feafiaffl 




good qualities of Teutonic food, it cannot be qualified 
by the adjective dainty, though it is probably better 
fuel upon which to tour than tea and pastry. On 
the whole, the German beer garden is more enjoyable 
than a stuffy tea-shop or cafe. One sits under shady 
trees on the bank of a river, if there is one, with a 
good band playing within sight and sound, the Ger- 
man not being able to eat an enjoyable meal or drink 
with pleasure, without good music and plenty. The 



364 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

menu is abundant, but half a litre of beer, with a 
cheese or ham sandwich, or a plate of cold meat gar- 
nished with potato salad, is an indication that suffi- 
cient business is being transacted to warrant your 
being allowed to spend a whole afternoon or evening 
without being expected to move on. 

The average German beer garden is an eminently 
proper place, even for the lone woman. The cli- 
entele around one will be made up of family parties, 
apparently occupying themselves with drinking end- 
less chains of steins of beer, but in reality making 
one big mug last a whole evening. Chiefly it is the 
size of the beer mug that makes the German out 
such a hard drinker. There is usually coffee to be 
had if one wants it, though it is not necessary to 
follow the custom recently established in the more 
popular and showy beer gardens of the towns and 
make one's own coffee at the table. This is sup- 
posedly a local custom, but in reality has been estab- 
lished as a costly detail with which to keep the 
tourist interested. 

In Germany, Teutonic Switzerland and Austria 
are found the classic and monumental beersteuben, 
gaudy with ornate mediaeval German decorations, 
where much the same programme, with its accom- 
paniments, is carried out indoors. 

The family life in evidence in Germany gives the 
woman from abroad a feeling of security that is 
often wanting in the surroundings of the French 
cafe; the "other world" does not to any extent 
frequent the best class of these German establish- 



LIGHT REFRESHMENTS 365 

ments, or if it does, it is not in such a way that the 
stranger is cognisant of it as an element. This diver- 
sion of music and light refreshment is also a solution 
as to what shall be done with the woman traveller's 
evenings, and as one phase of German family life 
is here spread out for inspection, contemplation of it 
should be most instructive and amusing. 

Since the French cafe practically serves no nourish- 
ment other than its liquid refreshments — a fact that 
Americans abroad do not always take into considera- 
tion — and since that delightful adjunct of foreign 
life is treated of elsewhere in this book, no further 
reference is made. 

In the cities and large towns of France are found 
" Cafe-Restaurants " and " Brasseries," and these, 
while having their limitations as to menus, will cater 
for the hurried hungry one with such simple dishes 
as cold meats, sandwiches, eggs and always a plat de 
jour — a single special hot dish each day. 

In Belgium and Holland, those indeterminate 
countries where the characteristics of food and drink 
borrow much from either side — Holland from the 
German and Belgium from the French — the cafe 
and the beer hall thrive side by side, each practically 
unchanged from what it is in the land of its birth. 

In Brussels, to mark another distinction, is to be 
seen the popular " Taverne." Nowhere else does 
the combined eating and drinking place of this class 
rise to such a height. Virtually it is an elaborated 
cafe, with a full restaurant service. For anything 
approaching a substantial meal, one picks out a place 



366 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

at one of the already set out tables; if only a sand- 
wich, a glass of beer or a cup of tea is wanted, one 
is served on a plain oak table undressed with napery. 

There remains but one form of itinerant eating 
abroad to be considered in the nature of a simple 
repast, and by this is referred to such refreshment 
as one takes at a railway station in the interval be- 
tween trains. In France some of these railway eat- 
ing houses are really excellent, celebrated even, like 
that at Dijon. This comes rather in the class of a 
pretentious restaurant, but the lunch counter acces- 
sory is conducted on the same bountiful lines, the 
three-franc dejeuner of the restaurant descending in 
price, but not in quality, to the one franc, twenty-five 
centime repast of the marble-topped table of the 
lunchroom. Snails and the rich red wine of Bur- 
gundy are likely enough to be an accompaniment of 
each, hence the epicure has only impecuniosity to re- 
gret in case he dines or sups at the lower price. 

The dining-car services on European railways are 
good or bad as the mood is on, but they serve their 
purpose in a way, though there is nothing especially 
characteristic of any land about them or their food, 
nor is their provender or cooking any better than 
it ought to be. Moreover, they are costly. 

Dining on the cross channel boats between Eng- 
land and France is atrocious, as indeed it is at most 
railway eating houses in England. On Mediterra- 
nean steamers between France and north African 
ports, particularly on those lines which are French, 
the formal French course lunch and dinner is often 



LIGHT REFRESHMENTS 367 

excellent, if one is able to partake thereof — wine, 
coffee and liqueurs being included — for the smilingly 
blue waters of the Mediterranean Lake can be tur- 
bulent at times. 

One lunches and dines delightfully, too, on a 
Rhine steamer, as luxuriously or as simply as one 
will, on deck, in between glimpses of Rhine castles, 
to the accompaniment of the inevitable German band. 
On the boats of the Swiss and Italian lakes the same 
thing is partially true, but the melody which goes 
with the meals is more of the dulcet Italian variety 
than that of the brazen Teuton. 




FEMININE VIEWPOINT 

SEARCHERS AFTER THRILLS 

FUNCTION OF THE CAFE 

CAFE ETIQUETTE FOR THE FRENCHWOMAN 

CAFE CLIENTELE 

CAFES OF THE PARIS BOULEVARDS 

AMERICAN FAMILY AND PARIS CAFE 

ENGLISH OUTLOOK 

PARIS CAFES AND BRASSERIES 

PEEP AT BOHEMIA 

CAFES OF THE LATIN QUARTER 

GIRL ART STUDENTS 

ART AND THE CAFE 

CAFES OF THE FRENCH TOWNS 

SMALL CAFES OF THE PROVINCES 

FRENCHWOMAN " EN TOUR " 

CAFE FOR THE WOMAN TRAVELLER 

USEFULNESS OF THE FRENCH CAFE 

CAFE BEVERAGES 

FRENCH CUP OF COFFEE 

INNOCUOUS " TIZANES " 

ICE AND ICES 

MINERAL WATERS 

MISUSE OF THE WORD CAFE 

COFFEE AND ROLLS 



XV 



THE WOMAN TRAVELLER AND THE 
FRENCH CAFE 

An American woman once asked a woman friend, 
confidentially, as to what she might do, now that she 
was in Paris, that would be " real daring and un- 
conventional." She was acting on the general delu- 
sion that one goes to Paris for the most attractive 
form of high-class bohemianism as one goes to 
Brussels for lace and Geneva for furs ! 

Her sophisticated friend answered her by telling 
her to go to a cafe at eleven o'clock at night and 
drink an absinthe! 

Neither of these searchers after thrills realised 
that the only part of the programme that would 
really shock the habitues of any Paris cafe would be 
the wooing of the "Green Fairy" of the hour of 
the aperitif (which is a before-dinner function) so 
late in the day. 

This fairly illustrates the common feminine view- 
point of the ofttimes useful and always attractive 
French cafe. As a matter of fact, the French cafe 
(for while its counterpart exists in all Continental 
Europe, its origin is French, and it there fulfils best 
its functions) is neither an eating house, a bar-par- 
lour, or a saloon, as is often imagined; and certainly 

371 



372 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

the average well-kept French cafe is far from being 
an objectionable resting-place for the weary traveller, 
man or woman. It might be better described as a 
meeting-place where the Frenchman goes to take his 
after dejeuner cup of coffee, or his aperitif before 
dinner. Here he reads his daily paper, writes a 




letter, perhaps, and, bon pere de famille though he 
is, often has a quiet game of dominoes or backgam- 
mon with a friend. 

The rules governing the sobriety and propriety of 
the cafe in France are strict and usually enforced, 
and the conventional cafe and its clientele is in general 
most orthodox. This, though, is not a defence of 
the cafe habit as it is unfortunately frequently prac- 
tised by many Frenchmen and strangers alike, but a 



WOMAN TRAVELLER AND FRENCH CAFE 373 

few notes and hints as to how and when it may be 
made useful, within limits, to the woman traveller 
abroad. 

Taking the cafes of France as the most perfect 
exponents of that useful institution, it is to be re- 
marked that their etiquette changes as does the topog- 
raphy and climate of their environment, but it almost 
universally is to be remarked that no Frenchwoman 
of repute, regardless of her standing in the social 
scale, enters a cafe unless attended by some male 
member of her family, or with friends, but still under 
the protecting wing of some man belonging to the 
party. There may be times and occasions which 
make justifiable exceptions to rules: at a cafe in a 
railway station, perhaps, or at some watering place, 
or ville d'eau; but in a general way the edict may be 
taken as absolute, and its observance taken to strict 
account save in those exceptional conditions that one 
has to deal with as they come up. 

In Paris, the female portion of the cafes' clientele 
is largely made up from the gay underworld, and it 
is this fact which is largely responsible for the stigma 
which has been attached to the cafe idea. But there 
are cafes and cafes; it is not especially of the grand 
cafes of the capital that this article deals. The 
cafes of the Grands Boulevards are frequented also 
by the tourists who go because they think, as did 
the American woman, that it gives the naughty zest 
needed to accentuate their trip abroad, but more 
often for the better reason that from the wicker 
chairs grouped around the little tables on the terrasse 



374 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

of such establishments as the Grande Cafe, the Cafe 
de la Paix, the Cafe Royale or Pousset's, they have 
the best viewpoint of the brilliantly moving pageant 
of Paris life. These are the orchestra seats at the 
passing show. 

To the Parisian cafe the American man confidently 
brings all the members of his family, from the school- 
girl in short dresses to the young lady whose coming 
out is put down for that autumn, when they have all 
returned and settled down in Oshkosh or Oskaloosa. 
They order one of the many sweet, coloured drinks 
which the cafe supplies in any chromatic combination 
or taste that one's fancy may suggest, and which they 
don't like overmuch after they get them. All this 
joyous family laugh and talk together as if they 
were at a garden party at home, meanwhile casting 
envious glances at the resplendent world of Paris as 
it passes by. It is all a part of the Paris game, and 
the mere man pays the bill and tips the garqon over- 
plus and they all move on contented enough with the 
first act of the piece, perhaps to do the same thing 
over again a few doors away, where the stage is 
similarly set, quite unconscious of the character of 
the crowd with whom they have rubbed elbows, the 
furtive-eyed women and the boulevardiers. 

The English family party may be seen there too, 
but in no such numbers, nor are they so oblivious 
to their surroundings; their attitude is one of recog- 
nition, but indifference. They are away from home, 
among foreigners, so what difference can it make? 
Besides, the English family is not so apt to be bur- 



WOMAN TRAVELLER AND FRENCH CAFE 375 

dened with the " young person," and they are pleased 
to be able to relax from a traditional prudery in the 
genial atmosphere of Paris, a city which asks nothing 
from the strangers within her gates, but that they 
shall make as sleek an appearance as do the inhab- 
itants themselves, and dispense money with an open 
hand. 

There are certain of the higher class cafes and 
brasseries of the Paris boulevards where more or 
less elaborate musical programmes are given each 
evening, or on certain evenings during the week. It 
is understood that the brasserie, in this case, means 
an establishment which makes a specialty of serving 
beer, more or less after the German manner, though 
it also purveys all of the varied assortment of drinks 
to be had in the conventional cafe. 

Here in these brilliantly lighted cafes, brasseries 
and " tavernes " — another English word which has 
crept insiduously into French — one occasionally sees 
a French family entire taking a peep into what they 
fondly consider a bypath of Bohemia under the guise 
of a musical evening. Young girls may be of the 
party, but invariably strongly and discreetly flanked 
by a solid and substantial brace of parents, besides, 
more often than not, a grandparent or two as well, 
or at least an uncle or an aunt. All in all they are 
a most decorous and orthodox party. They sip in- 
nocent, sweet drinks, listen attentively to the very 
good music and leave early, at the hour when others 
are just beginning to warm up and have a good time. 

About the only cafes in Paris that the English- 



376 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

speaking woman is to be seen at alone are certain of 
those in the Latin Quarter, or in the vicinity of the 
Gare Montparnasse. And these are the very ones 
that they should not frequent, certainly not without 
a male escort. 

These cafes of the " Rive Gauche " particularly 
fascinate the youthful girl art students who flock to 
them in droves when the day's work is over, prin- 
cipally on account of their real, or supposed, celebrity, 
of which they have read in some highly coloured ac- 
count of the real student world of Paris. They 
flatter themselves at this stage of their careers, if 
they have not already done so before, that they are 
floating glorywards in the true ethereal atmosphere 
of art. These young aspirants of the cafes of the 
Rue de Rennes and the Boulevard Montparnasse all 
carry note-books, in which they peck away at little 
sub-rosa sketches of the people around them, as they 
understand is the cafe-habit of those really great in 
the art world. They will stare some assuming 
young, or old, painter, who may have come to the 
cafe for some good and sufficient reason, out of 
countenance at a vain attempt at hero-worship, for 
the majority of them are young girls and know no 
better than to be seen alone, or in bunches, amid sur- 
roundings more or less questionable because of their 
geographical location. 

Occasionally a young girl of this class is to be seen 
showing some older and more staid maiden relative 
the sights of the neighbourhood. She has only been 
in Paris for a week, and leaves again on the follow- 



WOMAN TRAVELLER AND FRENCH CAFE 377 

ing Saturday, and is thus so impressed by " Mamie's " 
or " Carrie's " strides in art-lore and worldly wisdom 
that she neglects to pass judgment upon the sur- 
roundings, or even question their propriety, even were 
she fitted to do so. 

There is one well-known more or less bohemian 
cafe of this same neighbourhood whose regular 
clientele has been absolutely driven away by these 
hoards of stranger women and girls. And now the 
aspirants are driven to sketching themselves, since 
no celebrity willingly puts in an appearance until 
after this element has left. 

Young girls, or any unconducted woman, will do 
well to keep away from cafes of this type altogether, 
for they will get no stimulus for either art or morals 
therefrom, beside subjecting themselves to criticism 
they would shrink from if they comprehended its 
full significance. 

In some of the larger provincial capitals, such as 
Rouen, Lyons or Bordeaux, it is quite the thing for 
a section of the local society element to patronise 
certain of the larger cafes. Here family groups 
will be seen between the hours of four and six 
in the afternoon taking an ice, or even tea, or 
" le five o'clock," as the French call it. The cafe 
then becomes a rendezvous for friends and acquaint- 
ances, and assumes somewhat the air of a legitimate 
social function. 

It is in the small towns, however, that one finds 
the typical cafe functioning in its best and most 
legitimate sense, in the chefs-Heux, or county towns, 



378 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

and in the Sous-Prefectures. The etiquette to be 
observed by the resident of the small French town 
is something remarkably stringent. It is here that 
the cafe is more nearly a man's club, and no woman 
resident would dream of setting a foot inside of it 
save on certain very special open-house occasions, 
such as a general, or local, fete-day, the jour de Van, 
or the Fete Nationale on the fourteenth of July, and 
then is only allowed as a great concession to the cause 
of liberty by an indulgent husband or brother, or in 
company of a party of relatives or friends. 

Curiously enough, away from home, en voyage, 
the Frenchwoman avails herself of the privileges and 
the accommodations of the cafe as suits her fancy, 
though in most cases she will even then be found 
protected by some male relative who has come to the 
station to see her off or to meet her. For such a 
simple want as a cup of coffee, an ice, or any slight 
refreshment, she is thus well catered for, though it 
would never occur to her to apply to the same source 
in her own town. When she travels the thing be- 
comes " comme il faut," though a Frenchwoman 
travelling alone is almost as rare a sight as would 
be that of the dodo. If Frenchwomen are encoun- 
tered alone, even in a country town, it may be safely 
assumed that the protecting male missed connections 
somewhere along the line, and that the journey is 
more or less lengthy away from home. It may be 
set down, however, that the Frenchwoman rarely 
avails herself of this concession to her needs, usually 
preferring to load herself down with a big lunch 




Oh 
< 



H 



WOMAN TRAVELLER AND FRENCH CAFE 379 

basket in which she can carry a bottle of wine, or 
water, for her refreshment. The Frenchwoman's 
wants are simple whilst travelling, and easily satis- 
fied, and though she may have to wait three hours 
for a train in correspondence at some junction point, 
she would much prefer to spend her time in the 
waiting-room of a station, or in the draughty train- 
shed of some of the great gare, rather than seek the 
comfort and shelter of a nearby cafe. Travel, for 
the Frenchwoman, is an uncomfortable procedure 
at best, and all its inconveniences she has made up 
her mind to suffer stoically before she started out. 

Such a condition would never exist for the Amer- 
ican girl with a thirst bred of the drinking of much 
iced water, or for her English cousin who counts the 
day lost that does not begin and end with tea. To 
them the cafe will fill a long-felt want. 

What, though, is the English-speaking woman 
traveller to do who has not a male escort by her, 
and probably two-thirds of those who travel are with- 
out that useful adjunct? 

The answer is simple: make use of the latitude 
given the woman traveller, notwithstanding French 
etiquette, and patronise the respectable, modest- 
looking cafe on the corner opposite. Nothing will 
be amiss in your so doing, so do not be dismayed. 

• It is quite possible for the woman tourist, with 
or without a male escort, to go to a cafe in any part 
of France and order what she may wish within the 
limits of what they can supply. This may indeed be 
a breach of French etiquette as it is practised, but 



380 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

the fact that she is a foreigner, one of those 
etrangeres whose goings and comings are not to be 
measured by French feminine standards, will amply 
excuse the action in the eyes of the occupants of the 
cafe, and should justify one's presence to herself 
and to the world. 

If one is sometimes stared at in a cafe it is not 
likely to be so much out of rudeness, nor familiarity, 
as from curiosity. The men are usually so absorbed 
in their backgammon, dominoes, picquet or boston, or 
engrosssed in discussions of local affairs over their 
maza grans and their petit s verres as to usually be 
indifferent, utterly, to the feminine intruder. The 
average provincial Frenchman is much more decor- 
ous than our traditions have led us to suppose; this 
one may put down for an indisputable fact. 

It is difficult to see how the woman en tour in the 
picturesque provinces of old France, in the little 
towns off the beaten tracks, can avoid the cafe, even 
should her instincts be against it. Whether attended 
or not, it is but natural that her tastes should demand 
a cup of black coffee after dejeuner or dinner; and 
if her habits are such that she is perfectly miserable 
without a refreshing cup of tea in the afternoon, she 
surely ought to have a chance to gratify these simple 
wants. 

Outside the cities and the resorts it is almost im- 
possible to get a cup of coffee that is drinkable in 
France, the supposed land of good coffee; and the 
tea is of a more debatable quality even. This comes 
undoubtedly from the fact that the hotels are not 



WOMAN TRAVELLER AND FRENCH CAFE 381 

in the habit of supplying these two articles of con- 
sumption, and indeed the proprietor expects his 
clientele to patronise the neighbouring cafe for them, 
where, for a fact, he goes himself often enough for 
his after-dinner coffee. 

To be sure, if pressed, he will make a shift and 
turn out something that goes under the name of tea 




•**>,* ' 



or coffee, but it will not only be undrinkable, but 
cost more than a better, fresher infusion to be had 
at a cafe. 

Do not hesitate, then, to patronise the local cafe 
of the small French town where you may be " do- 
ing " a cathedral or a chateau. Its general aspect 
may be lowly, but it may possess a grimness coming 



382 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

of many generations of smokers, but its tiled, or, 
perhaps, sawdust strewn floor is probably cleaner than 
it looks, and one will find compensating amusement 
in the study of the local types to be seen there, as 
well as the opportunity of partaking of the refresh- 
ment one desires. 

One fares best at the French cafe in the warm 
season, when all the world sits outside under the 
awnings on the terrasse, which may be even a real 
terrace shaded with vines and screened from inquisi- 
tive passersby by evergreens in tubs, or, more fre- 
quently, merely a part of the sidewalk for which the 
proprietor pays a tax or a rental to the municipality 
for the privilege of putting out his tables and chairs. 

Here is another problem solved — after a fashion 
— for the woman traveller. A sitting-room of any 
description is practically unknown in the French 
country hotel, and even in many of those of the 
larger towns where tourists of convention do some- 
times happen along. What is the indefatigable 
woman sight-seer to do, then, when she wants to 
gather strength for another round? Stay in her bed- 
room? Shades of Saint-Hubert — the patron saint 
of hotel-keepers — forbid. Fancy the tired traveller 
resting or writing in the bare, chilly, bedroom of the 
average French country hotel, with never an easy- 
chair of any kind. Writing on one's knees may be 
feminine, but it isn't comfortable. 

There is really nothing left but to do as the French 
do; use the cafe for a sitting, reading or writing- 
room, according to one's needs; and one can do this 



WOMAN TRAVELLER AND FRENCH CAFE 383 

for as long a time as they choose for the price of 
a cup of coffee or tea, or a glass of milk (hot or 
cold), if tastes are more simple. 

Often there will be a cafe attached to the hotel, 
but conducted quite as a separate establishment; if 
not, the hotel proprietor will direct you to the one 
you should patronise, considering that what you may 
want is a certain recognition as to its propriety. Any- 
way, when in doubt, fall back on common sense, and 
use your best judgment, which will soon become 
trained and able to scent the cafe best suited to your 
needs as far as you can see its name on the sign over 
the door. 

To the woman traveller with scruples, who thinks 
she will be obliged to drink only alcoholic beverages 
if she goes to a cafe, the following may tend to 
relieve her mind. 

There will always be coffee on tap, black, black as 
strong coffee can be, and blacker yet sometimes when 
an undue amount of chickory has been added. It 
will be served either in a cup or a tall glass, as you 
prefer, the latter, known as a mazagran, being its 
most acceptable form. To women, the custom seems 
to be to serve it without question in a small cup, this 
seemingly being a spontaneous concession to the pres- 
ence of the fair sex and their desire to drink coffee 
any way, which, indeed, many Frenchwomen do not, 
except in the early morning. Whether one takes it 
in a glass or in a cup, the quantity and the price are 
the same. 

If coffee with milk is wanted, you should ask for 



384 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

cafe-creme, and not for cafe-au-lait. In either case 
it is the same thing, save that in the former instance 
it is generally served in the tall glass, and in the 
latter it will generally be accompanied by another 
glass in which reposes a jauntily rolled serviette, or 
doily, for which adornment you will perhaps pay 




TH£ FR€NCH CUPOF CpFFfce 




double the regular price for the same coffee and the 
same milk — not crime, though it be called such. 

One finds good tea now at almost any important 
cafe in any French town of eight or ten thousand in- 
habitants. The French, within the past few years, 
have become quite confirmed tea drinkers, and while 
the English afternoon tea habit is only an adjunct of 
the " high-life " whose members ape foreign ways, the 
provincial Frenchman often takes a cup of tea after 
meals instead of coffee. 

Tea ordered in a French cafe is always served 
" nature," without milk. If milk is wanted it must 



WOMAN TRAVELLER AND FRENCH CAF£ 385 

be asked for, and in addition, an increased price is 
paid usually, the combination costing perhaps fifty 
centimes, whereas otherwise it may be but thirty or 
thirty-five. 

One can also get hot or cold milk at a cafe, though 
the latter will most likely have previously been boiled, 
and thus in warm weather will lack a certain fresh- 
ness of taste which will not be agreeable to every- 
body. 

All cafes serve a remarkable assortment of 
" tizanes " on order, infusions of most of the leaves 
and blossoms of the herborists' encyclopedia. They 
taste, all of them, like the medicines at which we 
used to revolt in our youth, but are supposed to be 
beneficial for real or imaginary nerves or other slight 
indispositions. And they probably are; or at least 
they are probably harmless. 

The most frequently called for of these " tizanes " 
is that made of tilleul, the leaves and blossoms of the 
linden tree. Verveine is made from what is popu- 
larly called the lemon verbena, and so on down the 
list. There is cammomile, mint and many more, 
which truth to tell often do not look inviting, what- 
ever may be their virtues. They are served in the 
same manner as tea, always in a cup, and boiling hot. 

Lemonade, the kind you really want, in a French 
cafe is known as citron press e, or citronnade, never 
as limonade. In the former case you are brought 
a cut lemon, a glass scraper, or pressoir, and the other 
accessories necessary to make the lemonade yourself; 
and in the latter, you are served a horrible abomina- 



386 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

tion out of a bottle, made probably of a solution of 
citric acid, and not in the least related to lemonade, 
save as the name appears on the label on the bottle. 

You may not always be able to get real lemonade, 
and the American girl must not as a regular thing 
count on ice, though if ice (glace a refraicher) can 
be had anywhere in town it is at the cafe, though 
usually only in the heated term. 

In summer, the cafes of the cities and large towns 
make a specialty of ices — creams and sorbets. They 
are small in quantity, and large in price, and rather 
thin for the American girl's taste. They are served 
in single flavours, or as a melange or panachee, that 
is, two or more kinds to a portion, but must be so 
ordered, unless indeed you order one of each flavour, 
as many an American girl has done before now, to 
the astonishment of the usually placid French garqon. 

All the celebrated French mineral waters can be 
had at any cafe with any pretence whatever, though 
you will be forced to order a bottle, or in some cases, 
half a bottle ; though recently the tiny quarter bottles 
of Vichy have appeared, and the drinking of them as 
an aperitif by the supposedly blase Frenchman has 
become quite a fad. Prices are usually marked on 
a saucer, which accompanies the article ordered, and 
range from thirty centimes to seventy-five centimes 
as a rule. 

The misuse of the word " cafe " in our own 
country as applied to an eating place often misleads 
the traveller into the belief that the cafe abroad is 
also a restaurant; but this is only the case when the 



WOMAN TRAVELLER AND FRENCH CAFE" 387 

sign reads " Cafe-Restaurant," otherwise nothing eat- 
able is to be had in the usual cafe. The one excep- 
tion being, that in the larger towns, if one wishes 
to take their morning cafe-an-lait or chocolate at a 
cafe (which is frequently preferable to taking it at 
the hotel), it is possible to order a roll or a brioche 
with it, which the garqon will bring in from the 
nearby pastry shop, or boulangerie; but beware of 
complicating the order by a demand for butter — you 
may have to wait half the morning for it to arrive, 
but more often it is not forthcoming at all. 

The cafes of the great resorts, like Aix-les-Bains, 
Trouville, Nice or Biarritz, are got up principally 
for their strange clientele, and consequently provide 
for all tastes, with perhaps less that is French about 
them than any other cafes in France. Here women 
are expected, and are usually to be found in as large 
numbers as the men. Their tastes are especially 
catered for, and here one can get afternoon tea, 
a V Anglais, with cut bread and butter and all the 
rest, jam if you like it, and plum-cake, which they 
know as " peekfreen," after the name of its maker. 

A word at the end : as our French friends say. 

The usefulness of the French cafe for the woman 
traveller will be greatly enhanced by a discreet man- 
ner and an unobtrusive one in the part she is playing 
as a globe-trotter. 

The American girl will do well to observe and 
copy closely the feminine manners and customs of 
the country in which she may be touring. Then 
when she must defy convention it will be with as 



388 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

little foreign cachet as possible. This will go far 
to smooth the way. 

Much is forgiven the etrangere to be sure, and 
her presence at the French cafe is the least of the 
" shockings " that will be remembered by her French 
critics long after her radiance has passed away. 
" Les dames etrangeres sont toujours gentiles," has 
come to be a commonplace with the French. What- 
ever else they may think depends entirely upon the 
acts of the individual. 





mew&vmm 



FRANKFORT A CENTRE FOR SPAS 

FASHIONABLE HOMBURG CURES GOUT 

DRINKING WATER ON SCHEDULE 

COSMOPOLITAN BADEN BADEN 

WIESBADEN FOR RHEUMATISM 

POPULAR SPA OF THE GERMANS 

NAUHEIM CURES ALL HEART PANGS BUT LOVE 

UNIQUE EMS FOR THE THROAT 

HISTORY MADE AT EMS 

NEUNAHR'S FAMOUS APOLLINARIS SPRING 

MUD BATHS OF KREUZNACH 

SCHWALBACH, THE WOMAN'S SPA 

WILD BAEDER OF THE BLACK FOREST 

BADENWEILER OF THE ROMANS 

FAMOUS SPAS OF BOHEMIA 

KINGLY MARIENBAD 

MARIENBAD REGULATES AVOIRDUPOIS 

A MILK CURE 

VOGUE OF CARLSBAD 

CARLSBAD FOR HIGH LIVING 

PUPP'S HOTEL 



XVI 

SOME GERMAN SPAS 

It is in the Valley of the Rhine and its tributaries 
that are grouped the world's most famous springs 
and baths. Supposedly this is a condition born of 
internal volcanic eruptions, and a spot is said to exist 
at Homburg, where only fifty metres separate the 
surface of the earth from the unquenched convulsions 
which are continually going on within. Nauheim, 
Wiesbaden and Ems are also sizzling on the same 
hot-plate. 

The beneficient effects of the waters of these 
springs come from something more than their chemi- 
cal constituents, else the chemists with a handful of 
salts could fabricate oceans of it — which they can't. 
The ingredients are known and their proportions, but 
they won't mix, at least after they are mixed they 
will not produce the same results. 

Around the financial capital of Frankfort centre 
the chief of these German spas. A high or low or 
swollen liver, gout in its most rabid form, and many 
other fashionable diseases of the wealthy are treated 
at Homburg; rheumatism at Wiesbaden; palpitations 
and heart weakenings, from any cause but love, are 
nowhere so efficaciously cared for as at Nauheim; and 
a smoker's throat is sure to find relief at Ems. It 

391 



392 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 



is thus that diseases and their cures are specialised, 
though doubtless under a certain regime the same 
thing might be accomplished at Homburg where, at 
the Elizabeth Spring, according to Justus von Liebig, 

is found a water 
with many of the 
attributes of, and 
superior to, all oth- 
ers, with the newly 
opened Kaiserin 

Au guste- Victoria 
Quelle a close 
second. 

Besides all this, 
Homburg is a re- 
sort, and an ex- 
pensive one, with 
super-luxurious ho- 
tels, but not gaudy, 
and abounding in 
comfort. 

One drinks and 
bathes, commencing with the early hour of seven 
and continuing to the accompaniment of the or- 
chestra in the park all through the day. Your 
drinking glass at the spring is numbered, and 
for the time being is your property, and you sip 
your quota, walk briskly a bit, then go back to 
breakfast, when by following a sort of time-table, or 
schedule, you are kept more or less at it, drinking 
and bathing all through the day. It should be said 




SOME GERMAN SPAS 393 

that you put yourself in the hands of a doctor imme- 
diately on arriving — as you do at other spas — and 
you drink just what and just the quantity he pre- 
scribes, eat accordingly and bathe to the same tune, 
in hot, cold or tepid water, or in an adhesive mixture 
of mud, as the case may be. This is Homburg, with 
tennis, golf, croquet and what not interspersed during 
the day, and bridge and bacarrat all night if you are 
brave enough to face the doctor the next day and tell 
him of it. 

Baden Baden, too, is fashionable, its waters effica- 
cious and its prices Eiffel Tower high and something 
more. An overseas clientele in the majority has 
done this, so if you want to keep up the reputation 
of your countrymen you must do your part. Hotels 
at Baden Baden outbloom those of Homburg for 
luxuriance, and there is no anti-semite feeling against 
residents of St. Louis, Frankfort, Vienna or the 
West End of London. It is very cosmopolitan, but 
the complexion is manifestly American. Beside the 
luxurious hotels of Baden Baden there are many 
villas which are rented for short periods, and with 
the culmination of "high-life" at the International 
Horse Racing Game in August, one of the most 
buoyant and rapid scenarios of American life abroad 
is here annually unrolled. For baths the most fa- 
mous are the Freiderich's Bad and the Kaiserin 
Auguste Bad, the former for men, and the latter 
for women, as their names will indicate to any one 
who gives them half a thought. 

Wiesbaden is the really popular German spa, in the 



394 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

eyes of the German at any rate, and he ought to know. 
Outsiders though are not noticeable by their absence, 
quite the contrary. The place has been called the 
Newport of Germany, but by what reasoning it is 
difficult to see. It is certainly chic in all its aspects, 
is modern, well-kept and does actually rank as the 
most frequented of all German spas, but not as much 
by Americans and English as it will be some day 
when it comes to be appreciated. It is a resort 
and a residence city in one. Its dead season is 
mid-summer, but spring and autumn sees it as 
crowded as Baden Baden in August; as a matter 
of fact, the climate is the finest all-the-year-round 
climate of any resort of its class in Germany or out 
of it. 

Palatial homes, large, roomy and architecturally 
imposing; innumerable and wonderful hotels, and a 
Kursaale with what is accounted one of the finest of 
German orchestras, as well as an opera troupe which 
ranks almost as high, gives Wiesbaden a cachet and 
a more distinctive flavour of things and institutions 
German than many of the more popular resorts. The 
new Kurhaus cost a million dollars or more, which 
shows the liberal hand that is planning for Wies- 
baden's future. 

The waters here present themselves in a couple 
of score of hot springs bubbling up all over the place 
as through a sieve. They attack rheumatism and 
sciatica in all their forms with a vigour known of no 
other European waters. The Goldenen Ross and 
the Schiitzenhof springs possess radio-activities. So- 



SOME GERMAN SPAS 



395 



ciety at Wiesbaden is as varied as mixed pickles — 
one should progress slowly. 

Nauheim is an overgrown, expanded village with 
great avenues and tree-bordered public squares. 
Shops of a certain fascinating aspect line one of 
these broad thoroughfares of the " new town," inter- 
spersed with hotels and villas which contrast in a 




story-telling manner with the old-time German archi- 
tectural forms, which, in the " old town," present a 
calm and tranquil aspect of picturesqueness that mod- 
ernity knows not of. 

Thousands come to Bad Nauheim for heart 
troubles which nowhere else can be treated so well 
as here. It is not so much a question of the waters 



396 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

as the installation and conveniences which exist here 
that makes the Bad the preferred haven for those 
looking towards a restoration to health. A sort of 
stimulating prickling or bubbling of the waters en- 
courages the heart to take up its normal functions 
or continue them with regularity, and once in the 
able hands of the Herr Doctor and the Herr Pro- 
fessors of Nauheim almost anything but an actually 
broken heart may be mended. Neurasthenic patients, 
too, find Bad Nauheim beneficial, and popularity in 
a mild way and of a most serious kind has descended 
upon it to a far greater degree than was thought 
likely when its first salt baths were opened in 1850, 
though we have to go back to the year 1255 for its 
first historical mention. 

There have been those looking for a gayer life 
who have reviled Nauheim as desperately monoton- 
ous and uninteresting, but it has its virtues as has 
been shown. 

Twenty marks are levied on the visitor, whether 
for health or for pleasure, for the care of the garden 
walks and the roads of the park, whatever may be 
the length of sojourn, and each peach or pear or 
picture postcard that is purchased pays its quota of 
tax as well. 

The cost of baths varies from a couple of marks 
to six or eight, which, with extras, such as towels, 
drinking water, weighing machine privileges, etc., 
demonstrates that the procedure is not a cheap one. 

A dozen of these resorts centre around Frankfort, 
which is a sort of open door to all the region, and 



SOME GERMAN SPAS 397 

which as a clearing house presents a cosmopolitan 
animation unknown elsewhere in Europe. The mer- 
chants of Frankfort cater to all classes of strangers; 
you may buy your favourite snap-on buttons and 
hooks and eyes made in Philadelphia, tooth powder 
from St. Louis, and the genuine American shoe, be 
it for men or women, though the German manufactu- 
rer does make an imitation of it for his countrymen 
and any others who will buy. Frankfort is mani- 
festly commercial, financial if you will, but it lends 
also the aspect of the resort in its leafy avenues, 
squares and boulevards, and, above all, in its en- 
vironment, whose landscape is not spoiled by belching 
factory chimneys as in the Rhenish provinces. 

At Ems the local colour changes, things are more 
workaday in their purport, but its slimy, unpleasant 
tasting waters work the wonders with diseases of the 
throat that only the imbibing of alkaline-muriatic 
water will, and Ems is the only spa of its kind in 
Germany. You inhale as well as drink at Ems, and 
whilst the procedure is not wholly agreeable it brings 
results, and that is what the practical man, or woman, 
of to-day wants. If it is desired to mingle worldly 
divertisement with one's cure, Ems falls off sadly, but 
there is always music, and the theatre after nightfall, 
which is better than bridge or dancing. 

Another treatment at Ems is that of compressed 
air. You might as well be in the grasp of the " iron 
maiden " herself so far as the sensation goes after 
you have been half an hour in an air-tight steel 
tank with a motive force of some kind, which may 



398 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

be steam, electricity or gasolene, pumping in air until 
the pressure is so great it would seemingly crush an 
egg-shell if not indeed your ear-drums; actually they 
stop short of this, but you experience the same sensa- 
tions that a mountain climber has at an elevation of 
ten thousand or more feet, and a pussy cat with her 
tiny lungs would probably die in half an hour. It 
must be a curious sensation indeed to be shut up, 
fully clothed, with books, papers and dominoes and 
chess at hand, in a steel-bound vault, awaiting an air 
pressure so great that life may suddenly leave you. 

The situation of the spa by the banks of the turbu- 
lent little river Ems is not exactly idyllic, but it will 
clo, and for a fact is a happy blend of much that 
goes to make up a conveniently situated resort, but a 
very business-like one. It is a sort of concentrated 
civilisation set down in the midst of a park. 

And now for a bit of history. A stone slab flush 
with the ground in the public square at Ems reads as 
follows : 



13 Juli 1870 — 9 Uhr 10 Min. 
Morgens 



How precise these Germans are! Freely translated 
it means that a certain, now historic, personage 
turned his back on another, now historic, personage, 
over the discussion of a subject which should have 
meant nothing to either of them. One was German, 
the other French, and the Frana>Prussian war re- 
sulted. This is how Germany makes a note which 
all who run may read. The Emperor William — the 



SOME GERMAN SPAS 399 

Great William — was fond of Ems, and it was here 
that was unrolled the first act of the drama which 
the plotter Bismarck so deftly engineered. There 
is also a monument to the Emperor at Ems — of 
course; another to the slain in battle, and yet another 
to Bismarck. Lest you forget ! 

The municipality of Ems is highly organised, the 
spa, commerce in general, the hotel industry in par- 
ticular, all benefit from a sane, astute oversight by 
the city fathers. Thirty thousand or more visitors 
come to Ems each year and together they must spend 
a couple of million dollars all told. It pays a muni- 
cipality to cultivate a wave of prosperity like this, 
which otherwise might flow by its doors. But after 
all Ems is not very worldly. 

Neunahr and Carlsbad treat diabetes, but if with 
heart complications, Neunahr, with the only alkaline 
hot spring in Germany, comes first, whose waters are 
sovereign also for cirrhosis, which, if vulgarly trans- 
lated from the German manner of naming it, is 
rather inelegantly to be called also " drunkard's 
liver." Neunahr is not greatly the vogue, but it is 
exclusive and has most luxurious appointments in all 
things that relate to the amusement and comfort of 
invalids who have not as yet approached the stage 
of incapacity of enjoyment or indifference to sur- 
roundings. 

To Americans and English, Neunahr ought to 
mean much, or suggest much, for it is here that is 
located the famous Apollinaris Spring which made a 
publisher, an artist and an author famous and wealthy. 



400 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

As a money-making enterprise of the first rank a 
popular bottled water is undoubtedly ahead of the 
writing or publishing of books, or the painting of 
pictures. Bubbling naturally from the ground, water, 
whatever its chemical constituents may be, costs but 
little in the first instance, and relatively but little more 
to put in bottle — the buyer pays the freight. Seven 
hundred employees do the work, and in a twelve- 
month 32,000,000 bottles of " polly " are shipped to 
all the ports of the seven seas; several bottles are 
drunk every minute, in one place or another, from 
January 1st to December 31st. Its a good deal bet- 
ter than a coal or a gold mine, for it comes to the 
surface through the impulse of nature's own forces. 
You don't have to hire Italians or Slovaks to mine it. 

Kreuznach possesses wonderful waters, and is 
quaint and picturesque on its own account. The 
waters, or the mud, here cures rheumatism and pos- 
sesses a radio-activity strong enough to be impressed 
upon sensitive photographic plates and paper. It is 
small wonder that such slime should have some effect 
on the epidermis. This spring and another in Bo- 
hemia are almost the only commercially exploited 
sources for the supply of radium. 

At Munster-am-Stein, a few miles from Kreuznach, 
is another spring of a similar nature. Near Frank- 
fort, too, is Soden, with warm springs whose waters 
are impregnated with salt, iron and carbonic acid 
gas, which are beneficial in bronchial affections and 
pulmonary diseases. 

For the automobilist this comparatively restricted 



SOME GERMAN SPAS 401 

area, where are located the most famous of the 
German spas, is a paradise. Seldom is there to be 
found a continuity of such park-like roads as those 
following the sinuosities of the Rhine, the Ems and 
the Lahn. 

Schwalbach or Langenschwalbach, to give it its full 
name, is celebrated afar as a resort, but its chief 
value to the economic universe lies in its value as a 
bathing place for the ills that women's flesh is heir 
to. Charged to profusion with free carbonic a 
plunge in these waters is like the famous bath in 
champagne of which the yellow journals told a few 
years since, but one is less sticky on coming out. 
It's an experience, if you happen to need that sort of 
treatment, and if ever such was efficacious, it must 
be so here. The place is gay, cosmopolitan and 
crowded. The springs, the Weinbrunnen and the 
Stahlbrunnen, are half a mile or more apart in the 
Kurhaus gardens. These are the springs whose 
waters are used internally; the others are for bathing 
only. Males are notable by their absence ; a few may 
be seen at the Herzog von Nassau, the Allesaal or 
the Villa Gartenlaube, but smoking is verboten at 
the springs and in the gardens where the band plays, 
so poor man is perforce obliged to give this delight- 
ful Bad of the Taunus the go-by. It is an Adamless 
Eden, if indeed there can be such a thing. What few 
men are to be seen, usually hie themselves off to the 
trout fishing at sunrise to return only to the hotels 
for supper. 

Schlangenbad, which is ugly enough in name and 



402 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

meaning (Snake Bath), has a water which in con- 
sistency is midway between aqua pura and a good 
stiff pea soup. There are from seventy to eighty 
per cent of non-mixing elements therein, and it is 
good for countless complaints, of which the doctors 




will tell you when you ask them, but which will burn 
your hair to the colour of reddish tow in a very short 
space of time. The town is delightfully sylvan on 
the banks of the little river Waldaffa, a tributary of 
the Rhine. 

Throughout the Black Forest are innumerable of 
these Wild Baeder. Not far from Baden Baden is 



SOME GERMAN SPAS 403 

one which bears the name of Wildbad itself. Its 
springs bubble forth a hot alkaline water, and the 
tiny town is a forest village in fact as well as name. 
Herrenalb nearby is called the paradise of the 
Schwartzwald, and is chiefly famous as an " after 
cure." Towards the Alps, along the southern bor- 
der of the forest range, off toward Switzerland, is 
Badenweiler, whose popularity and efficacy in pul- 
monary and nervous diseases was known to the Ro- 
mans, who established the first baths here a dozen 
centuries ago. To-day the bathing establishment is 
built upon Roman lines. 

Marienbad is a kingly resort; it was popular with 
the late King Edward, and the Emperor knows the 
Hotel Weimar here as well as the Kaiser does Herr 
Krupp's little chalet at Kiel. King's weather is 
usually the rule at Marienbad, and its summer climate 
and temperature is certainly all that could be desired. 

Folk do all the things that they are supposed to 
do at a spa; Bohemia is not different from Germany 
in this respect. The manifest complexion of all 
things is Austrian, but the Bohemians would have 
you know that it is Bohemian and nothing else. 
Lunch at the Rubezahl restaurant is quite the thing, 
as also is an afternoon assistance at the concert on 
the terrace, seated in a stuffy wicker mushroom chair 
lined with Turkey red calico, which is all right for 
the beach at Scheveningen, but manifestly quite in- 
appropriate here. Some unthinking person started 
the custom and it grew. There's another establish- 
ment called the Cafe Nimrod, which is a favourite 



404 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

resort of the Tzar of the Bulgares, and you are quite 
as likely to dine at the table opposite, as you are to 
meet Alphonse of Spain on the terrace at tea time at 
San Sebastian. 

Marienbad is two thousand feet above sea level, 
amid a forest framing which makes its worldliness 
delightful, for it is worldly, as worldly as any of 
the real European resorts, and has many big hotels 
with their satellite attractions, restaurants, casinos, 
music, theatre, opera and what not. Marienbad 
claims for its waters that they will make fat people 
thin and thin folk fat. Marienbad is a place of 
miracles apparently, though that claim has not yet 
been put forth. 

The place has a milk cure too, and is the home of 
a local sweetmeat which if partaken ad lib will annul 
any beneficial effects which may have been derived 
from the cure. The latter are cakes, or tartines, or 
gaufrettes, or something of the sort, heaped up with 
whipped cream, which half bury a half-dozen round, 
luscious cherries, the whole drowned in what tastes, 
and looks, like thinned-out honey, but which may be 
mere treacle. The diet will probably not make one 
thin, but it's pretty sure to put on fat. 

Carlsbad and Marienbad are the vogue; not that 
they compel one to stay on and on as do many other 
Continental spas, but that they are included in every- 
body's little tour of watering-places, or should be. 
The season at Carlsbad spins out to a greater length 
than formerly and now its visitors, augmenting in 
numbers by thousands each year, can scarcely find a 



SOME GERMAN SPAS 405 

room in any of the big hotels from June to Septem- 
ber, unless booked in advance. Stomachic and in- 
testinal diseases account for the coming thither of 
some of the seventy odd thousand visitors each year, 
but the far larger numbers are here because it is the 
vogue ; it sounds well when you get home to say that 
Carlsbad was included in your itinerary, and unless 
your stomach is actually a superior organ to that of 
most mortals, Carlsbad's sodium-sulphate, alkaline 
and carbonic waters will do you good if you don't 
object to the taste. 

Pupp's Hotel is world famous and its clientele 
cosmopolitan. Ferdinand of Bulgaria, two brothers 
of the Shah of Persia, the Persian ambassador at 
Vienna, Prince Orlaff, Prince Victor Dhulep Singh 
and the Duke of Teck all paraded before our eyes 
on one occasion on the terrace of this celebrated hotel, 

The cure, sylvan walks abroad, golf and the usual 
social functions of hotel drawing-rooms and casinos 
put Carlsbad in the very front rank of resorts of its 
class. 

Every visitor pays eight crowns as a kurtax, but 
it is paid willingly for the advantages given and the 
privilege of tarrying a while in such a well-ordered 
resort. This pays for the public amusements, bands, 
illuminations, etc. Why not? Who should ob- 
ject? 

Bad Gastein, like the Bohemia spas, is fashion- 
able, popular and costly. As late as October the 
Hotel Straubinger may be crowded, and the day may 
yet come when the place will bloom forth as a winter 



4 o6 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

resort. It is a tiny village perched at an elevation 
of three thousand five hundred feet above the sea, 
admirably sheltered from the north and not subject 
to winds in winter, and furthermore its January and 
February climate is proclaimed as something astound- 
ingly mild. 

Bad Gastein's springs are hot, bubbling cauldrons, 
and are supposed to quiet the nerves, and do. 

Everywhere are signs of expansion and progress, 
and the labour is seemingly all Italian. There is no 
class of house-builder living to-day that is better at 
stucco than the Italians; they alone seem to know 
how to build such houses so as to stand the ravages 
of time and rigorous winters, and actually at this 
moment Bad Gastein is being enlarged, rebuilt and 
remodelled by trans-Alpins. 

One objection there is to a stay at Bad Gastein, 
and that is the noise interminable made by the rush- 
ing waters of many waterfalls. Usually such phe- 
nomena of nature fall silently, many even fade away 
in a mist, but here they are seemingly more turbulent 
than Niagara. 







2y*-».3u.^? , r3i 



-u-n."^. 



ARTIST A PRIVILEGED CHARACTER 

DOLLAR A DAY RATE 

FIG TREE OF MARTIGUES 

PAINTER AND TOURIST 

CLASSES 

SKETCHING-GROUNDS IN FRANCE 

PAINTERS' HAUNTS ABOUT PARIS 

FONTAINEBLEAU AND BARBIZON 

ALONG THE VALLEY OF THE LOING 

daubigny's COUNTRY 

" TYPE " FROM THE LATIN QUARTER 

BOHEMIAN PICTURE-MAKING 

COSTUME MODELS OF BRITTANY 

PONT AVEN AND " JULIA'S " 

AMONG THE WINDINGS OF THE SEINE 

HOTEL BELLEVUE, PETIT ANDELYS 

IN MID-FRANCE 

PROVENCAL SCHOOL OF ART 

PAINTING IN SPAIN 

sorolla's OPEN-AIR STUDIO 

MEDITERRANEAN SKETCHING-GROUNDS 



XVII 

ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS 
ABROAD 

Those who travel with a paint-box and a white 
umbrella slung over their shoulders are a privileged 
class in Europe, and not the least of the concessions 
which are tacitly bestowed upon them is the right to 
pre-empt certain little corners and stake them out as 
their own, with the understanding that they have the 
first claim to the beauties by right of discovery and 
appropriation of these charms to the domain of the 
Republic of Art with a capital A. 

The original inhabitants are usually proud of the 
distinction, and encourage the artist in his proprietary 
attitude towards their country, thus forming together 
what might be called an artistic co-operative society, 
though this tends sometimes to place the plain, every- 
day tourist somewhat at a disadvantage. 

Let one come with a painting outfit, no matter 
from what land, or of what school of art they may 
be the followers, whether they set their palettes up- 
side down, — as do those latest radicals, the Post Im- 
pressionists, — draw everything on curves, give a 
porcelain finish to the interpretations of nature, run 
to a riot of colour, or paint everything in a scale of 
grey, she, or he, will be welcomed with a camaraderie 
and a genuine warmth, while the artistic possibilities 

409 



410 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

of the neighbourhood will be mapped out ungrudg- 
ingly. It is this which makes for the appeal of these 
artists' sketching-grounds scattered about Europe, 
though they are in danger of being spoiled by the 
laymen, who often come here to loaf, because of 




BBS 



Hotel Chabas 



the sympathetic qualities so different from those of a 
banal existence in a community whose occupations are 
of a purely social nature. 

There is no better way to travel cheaply than to 
carry a paint-box. The white umbrella is a passport 
that calls for moderate charges, and the artist can 



ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 411 

usually get into a hotel for five francs, while the 
casual traveller often pays double. Is this undue 
discrimination? No; it is but a rightful tribute to 
the profession. The word " artist " does not always 
say genius. Modesty forbids, for it is true that the 
more readily an artist can sling paint with ability, 
the more unassuming he usually is. No, the con- 
sideration is demanded in the interests of Art and a 
slim purse, and usually it is granted without ques- 
tion. Does he, or she, establish a scale of conduct 
based on the cut rate of five francs? No, indeed; 
the best that is to be had is demanded, and no one is 
disappointed. The landlord may snap his fingers and 
mutter " sapristi " under his breath, but he will give 
in to the privileged class sooner or later and be glad 
of the opportunity of doing so. 

As an illustration of local pride and artistic priv- 
ilege, the following will bear quoting: 

One summer from fifty to a hundred artist folk 
were sketching in a little Mediterranean fishing port 
— Martigues — in sunny Provence. It is one of those 
artists' sketching-grounds of which those Americans 
engaged in the serious business of touring have never 
heard, but to which the artists flock from all over 
Europe — French, Belgian, Austrian, Russian, all the 
cosmopolitan brotherhood. The Grand Hotel Cha- 
bas is the artists' headquarters in La Venise Pro- 
venc,ale. 

Martigues was originally brought into fashion by 
one of the greatest of modern colourists — Ziem — and 
its vogue has since become great. 



412 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

Here these artist men and women were busy put- 
ting on to canvas the picturesque life of the canals, 
the lateen-sailed Mediterranean fishing boats and the 
fisher people at work among their nets. These fisher 
folk, of Martigues have become inflated with pride 
at the distinction that Art has conferred upon them. 
Have not pictures of themselves, their boats and their 
houses decorated each year the walls of nearly every 
art exhibition in the world? They take as much 
pride in keeping up their end of the artistic standard 
as the artists themselves; they see to it that the 
mellow tints of their houses and boats are not dis- 
turbed by fresh coats of paint, and have learned to 
pose at their work in the manner most approved by 
the artists. 

There was one classic motive at Martigues which 
every one painted, one of those perfectly composed 
subjects, forming the keynote to one of the most 
picturesque corners of the town. It was a fig-tree 
that had sprung up from a crevice in the foundations 
of an old stone house overhanging one of the principal 
canals. One morning, to the consternation of the 
group of artists painting the " fig-tree house," as it 
was called, a crash was heard and down fell the tree 
into the water. It was learned that the house had 
been rented to a stranger, who, finding that the tree 
completely darkened the north side of the house, not 
unreasonably had it cut down. Townspeople and 
artists were alike horrified at the sacrilege. 

The artists hurried to the principal cafe to hold 
an indignation meeting and threatened to leave town 



ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 413 

in a body. Such a slight could not be put upon the 
municipality. The mayor could not put the tree 
back, but he would wait upon the unfortunate new- 
comer. The result was that an apologetic statement 
was published in the local paper to the effect that 
the stranger did not realise how much of an artistic 
asset the fig-tree really was, and that it would be 
permitted to grow again as speedily as the laws of 
nature would allow. 

The artist is the last lineal descendant of the gen- 
tleman vagabond of old. He is almost the sole sur- 
vivor of an uncommercial guild of workman. He 
goes on his summer outing with rolls of canvas in- 
stead of a dress suit, and with " stretchers " in place 
of boot-trees. He looks upon the automobile as his 
greatest curse, principally because it has been the 
means of bringing the ordinary tourist in droves to 
spy upon the beauties of many of his own particular 
painting grounds, and has been known even to refuse 
to sell a picture to the owner of one of these beasts 
of a machine, though he is not averse to riding in 
one when asked. Baedecker tourists the artist re- 
gards as his natural enemies, for are they not directly 
responsible for the advance in prices at the little inn 
which had for so long been content with his modest 
patronage? With every fresh batch of tourists that 
comes along he threatens to leave and look for an 
unspoiled location, though as a matter of fact he 
comes back year after year. 

The same little coterie of painters is usually to be 
found gathered together in some quaint inn on the 



4H THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

bank of some Dutch canal, by the olive and orange 
groves of the Mediterranean, in some barbarian moun- 
tain hamlet, or in some little Norman townlet in the 
valley of the Seine. Each year they discuss the same 
old theories with the same enthusiasm, and so it goes 
on from year to year, and will go on in spite of 
the comings and goings of the world that travels. 

The suffragette would find these artist communi- 
ties match up very nearly with her ideals of equality. 
The woman painter, if she is serious, if her work is 
worthy, is welcomed. Her status in the little com- 
munity is fixed, and she enjoys goodfellowship, both 
in work and play, to the utmost. 

To these sketching-grounds, too, come that bete 
noire of the serious-minded artist, the class of ama- 
teurs herded together under the supposed artistic 
guidance of some commercially minded maitre. 

Usually these classes are composed of women, sen- 
timental aspirants, willing enough to follow some 
leader, but too timid to strike out boldly for them- 
selves, either in art or travel. In this way they are 
able to enjoy a little of both, but invariably mixed 
in homeopathic proportions. For a stipulated sum, 
which usually includes their tuition and living ex- 
penses, they can paint under the eye of their teacher, 
for the term for which they have enlisted. It may 
be that for a certain sum they are allowed to study 
methods in the shadow of some master's easel, whilst 
their " keep " is a thing apart. Such classes may be 
composed of students of both sexes, but it is the un- 
attached woman, with a taste rather than a talent 



ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 415 

for painting, who forms the bulk of such followers, 
and water-colour is the medium in which she mostly 
sins. 

These international artist sketching-grounds are 
most numerous and most popular in France. This 
is but natural in a land which has given expression 
to the best of the painter's genius, and is responsible 
for the highest development of the " plein air" 
school of painting. Here art is officially recognised, 
is practically encouraged by the State, which yearly 
devotes a certain sum of the public funds for the 
purchase of pictures independent of the artist's na- 
tionality. The Nation even has its Ministere des 
Beaux Arts, who is a member of the Supreme Council 
of State, the Cabinet. No wonder artists possess 
the land, or at any rate some of its choicest spots, 
and that the stranger can wander about with a paint- 
ing kit and find always that truly warmest welcome 
at an inn. 

As soon as the Paris salons are closed the last 
of June, and the artists have recovered from the 
verdicts of success or failure which have been doled 
out to them, the studios of Montmartre and Mont- 
parnasse empty themselves out into the favoured 
haunts of the countryside. 

There are dozens of these about Paris, not too ex- 
pensive to reach or too expensive at which to stay. 
This makes for the popularity of the nearby places. 

Fontainebleau, with Barbizon as a centre, might 
be called the master school of modern outdoor paint- 
ing, though Barbizon to-day is more of a cheap 



416 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

trippers' resort than anything else ; not even the sacred 
association of the great Barbizon quartette of painters 
can draw the artist now, in the height of the tourist 
season. Instead he goes to one of a chain of little 
towns that skirt the southern border of the forest 
or the valley of the Loing, that has a summer 
clientele of artists, picturesque, old-time villages, un- 
touched by the near influence of Paris or the holiday- 
makers who haunt the forest proper. 

If old-time Barbizon, with its memories of Millet, 
Corot and Rousseau, is no longer the fashion, it is 
but a step across the forest to Moret, the centre of 
the present-day cult. Here Moret's ancient bridge, 
its water-mills, its town gates and walls and Gothic 
church — first made famous on canvas by Sisley — 
form a galaxy of motifs irresistible. 

Montigny, on the southern border, is one of the 
best of the forest gateways, and Bourron, with its 
quaint little Hotel de la Paix, is a great relief after 
more populous neighbourhoods. 

At Marlotte nearby a number of artists have 
built homes, and domesticity and art flourish together 
in many a picturesque little villa in this happy Valley 
of the Loing. 

Then there is Nemours, a bustling market town, 
and Larchant, with a ruined church sitting on a hill- 
top surrounded by lonesome pines. Not far away 
is the popular Grez and Crecy-en-Brie — where the 
cheese comes from. At all of these the artist, if she 
works it right, may be taken in at almost any small 
hotel for not more than five francs a day. 




T3 
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CQ 



X 



ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 417 

Up the valley of Oise, north of Paris, is 
Daubigny's country, with Auvers as its capital. Here 
on the walls of the Hostellerie du Nord are some of 
the master's sketches of this soft, green, pastoral 
country, but Paris' Sunday crowds rather ruffle the 
equanimity of the artist, and the real atmosphere of 
the place is sadly contaminated for one day out of 
seven. 

Just outside is Ville d'Avray, where one can paint, 
if not the same trees that did Corot, at least others 
that look the same. 

To one or another of these haunts comes the typi- 
cal Parisian artist of the velveteen corduroy suit, 
slouch hat and black, floating tie. He settles down 
for the summer, bringing not much else besides his 
painting kit, though occasionally some " unconven- 
tional " will bring with him his bon amie, a little 
model, perhaps, who may, or may not, at the same 
time keep studio for him in Paris. The life they 
lead will likely enough be decorous to view, she sit- 
ting beside him at her fancy work as he assumes to 
fabricate his masterpieces, and washing his brushes 
for him at the end of day. 

It is this sort of thing that is apt to give the lone 
woman artist a shock when she first drifts in on 
many of these little artists' sketching-grounds, and it 
is even true, sometimes, that there are gay doings in 
between periods of picture making, when the bohe- 
mianism is apt to be of a very genuine Montmartre 
quality, or again it is the atmosphere of the Quartier 
Latin which is transplanted to the open country. On 



418 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

the other hand, there are quite enough of the other 
elements to preserve propriety, though no sketching- 
grounds enjoy such a cosmopolitan freedom as do 
those of France. 

The social life of such places is thus apt to be a 
little disconcerting, and sometimes composed of 
startling elements, but as an old artist's model once 
said, " The American woman knows well the art of 
keeping the disagreeable outside her range of vision." 

The company one sees is as a congress of all na- 
tions. The English are there, painting decorously 
in company with their wives, and there is the sandy, 
canny Scot from the Glasgow school, and of course 
innumerable Americans — whom all foreigners regard 
rather jealously as the aristocrats of the profession, 
chiefly for the reason that they usually spend treble 
the sum that they need to. There are representa- 
tives from all northern lands; rabid German Seces- 
sionists, Austrians, Finns and all the strong army of 
Scandinavians. The one language which they have 
in common is that of art. 

Usually one dines out of doors in the pleasant 
country fashion in the courtyard of the little artists' 
inn, or on a terrace overlooking a river, and meal 
times are always the occasion of much " shop talk," 
the courses punctuated with impromptu picture ex- 
hibitions as canvases representing the day's work are 
propped up on chairs and exposed to the hot and 
merciless criticism of the party. 

What difference does it make if the soup is cold, 
or that a stray wasp drops into the confiture? No 



ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 419 

one grumbles except the ostracised tourist who may 
happen along. 

Further away from Paris one somewhat loses cer- 
tain objectionable features in connection with artists' 
life in easy reach of the capital of bohemianism. 
Brittany may be called the great " costume model " 
sketching-ground of France. Nowhere else in west- 
ern Europe do the inhabitants so tenaciously cling to 
old-time dress and customs as in this land of fetes 
and pardons. 

Pont Aven takes precedence over all other artists' 
towns of Brittany. It was the first to become a cen- 
tre for a little band of Parisian painters who were 
attracted here by its unique collection of water-mills 
and pretty girls. This was long ago, and the painters 
who first made Pont Aven famous are grey-headed, 
and the girls perhaps a bit faded, though others have 
come to take their places. 

Without " Julia " and her Hotel des Voyageurs, 
Pont Aven might never have become the world-re- 
nowed sketching-ground that it is. " Julia's " is still 
the chief gathering place for artists in all Brittany, 
but her clientele is chiefly of the younger generation. 
Concarneau is next door to Pont Aven, and usually 
takes the second place in popularity. The great Bay 
of Concarneau, dotted with the brown-sailed sardine 
boats, draped in their blue fishing nets, is a veritable 
symphony of blue and brown, and though the smell 
from the sardine canneries often drives the artist 
away, it is a fact that the ready-made motifs of the 
little fishing town are superlative of their kind. Then 



420 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

a little further westward is Quimperle. Who has 
not seen the washerwomen of Quimperle? They 
figure in every salon of every year. 

A few choice spirits prefer Poldhu, also on the 
shore. It is not so overcrowded, not to say amateur- 
ish, as Pont Aven, and the pretty fishermaids are not 
so nearly spoiled as those who have been longer in 
the profession as models. 

Camaret in Finistere, almost at the western point 
of France, is reminiscent of Cottet and his famous 
Luxembourg picture of its brown-sailed sardine fish- 
ing boats. After comes the bleak, black C6tes-du- 
Nord, a mysterious region of black rocks and sad, 
grey houses. All of Brittany has that touch of mel- 
ancholy about it that comes from the fight with the 
sea and hard conditions of life generally, but here it 
is more pronounced than elsewhere. 

Not the least of Rochefort-en-Terre's attractions 
is its Hotel le Cadre, and the artist who strolls along 
that way as he does the round will well remember the 
two little Breton sisters who preside over this neat 
and attractive little hotel of wild Brittany. 

On the north coast of France, not far from 
Boulogne, is Etaples. Its dirty streets are offset by 
the excellent Hotel Joos. At Etaples, a little artist 
colony has been formed by buying up, or renting, 
the fishermen's cottages at nominal prices and turn- 
ing them into studios. Such is the popularity of art 
that the native fisher people importune one to be taken 
on for models with as much insistence as the beggars 
of Naples appeal to strangers for money. 



ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 421 

A few miles away, but still within sight of the 
flashing twin lights on the dunes beyond Etaples, is 
Montreuil-sur-Mer, where, within the old town walls, 
at the sixteenth-century Hotel de France, or outside 
the walls at the Bellevue, you may live and be well 
taken care of whilst painting the charming gentle 
landscape of this region of tidal streams and poplar- 
lined banks. The same is true of nearby Picquigny, 
and little more than a dollar a day should cover the 
cost. 

There are some delightful painting centres hidden 
away in the windings of the Seine below Paris. No 
one part of France has been so painted as this silver- 
grey, serpentining ribbon of water edged by thin 
trees. 

Claude Monet is the lodestone that draws artists 
to Giverny. The place is just a little village of 
frame and stucco houses, with a few other dwellings 
a bit more pretentious sandwiched in here and there. 
The great modern impressionist has made his home 
here for years and received much of his inspiration 
from the tranquil charms of the rural neighbourhood. 
Giverny has become popular with " classes " of late, 
so prices have soared somewhat above what they were 
in a former day at the little Hotel Baudy. Baudy's 
is the one hotel of the place, and in season you may 
pay city prices. 

Further down river from Paris, below Giverny, 
are the Norman twin towns of Les Andelys. The 
artist goes to Petit Andelys, the town by the river, 
for the combination of the chalk cliffs and the grey 



422 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

walls of Chateau Gaillard towering high above the 
Seine, also for the privilege of living for a space 
at the Hotel Bellevue, one of the most characteris- 
tically excellent country inns of France. 

M. Thiriet, the proprietor of the Bellevue, can 
still be persuaded by his old, long-standing artist 




clientele into granting its members the traditional 
five-franc-a-day rate — if he likes you he will do any- 
thing for you, even lose money, — but for the masses 
he will hold up his hands in horror at the mere sug- 
gestion of such a figure. " Pas possible! Pas 
possible," he will say in a high treble. And judging 
from what one who is thus favoured gets for the 
money, it is not difficult to believe this in these days 
of increasing prices. 

Below Les Andelys, in another bend of the river, 
is Pont de l'Arche. It has for a unique attraction 
the only church in all the world dedicated to the 



ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 423 

cause of art and artists — Notre Dame des Arts. The 
Hotel de Normandie, by the old stone bridge with 
many arches, is a pleasant place to stay if one can 
get foot within the portal. Its capacity is limited, 
and it is popular with those who like to paint in 
tranquil, simply disposed surroundings. The salle 
a manger of the inn is decorated with panels, sketches 
which have been left behind by artists who have gone 
before as remembrances for the kindly proprietor. 

Caudebec-en-Caux, still by the banks of the Seine, 
is almost too popular as a sketching-ground. Its 
crazy old houses, whose foreheads almost touch each 
other over the meanderings of a tiny tributary of the 
Seine, are reminiscent of the architecture of the 
school drawing-books of olden time. 

Northward, sitting high on a bluff overlooking the 
sea, is Etretat, now no longer fashionable as a re- 
sort, nor popular as a painter's paradise. Isabey, 
Hamon and Fromentin all gave it a vogue among 
connoisseurs of canvas, and Alphonse Karr, the 
ecrivain-jardinier, sent its widespread fame abroad. 
All this is changed, but there will always be a scatter- 
ing of artist folks to be found here painting the won- 
derful effects of sea and sky and shore. 

Across the estuary of the Seine, opposite Le Havre, 
is Honfleur, the pays of Eugene Boudin, a painter 
whose vogue with a former generation was classic 
and whose motifs have been left behind for others 
to fabricate if they can, sturdy fishermen and women, 
all sorts and colours of boats, queer old tumble-down 
houses and quaint seaside churches and chapels. Nor- 



4 2 4 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

mandy, take it all in all, is one of the most varied 
and delightful of sketching-grounds. 

Down through mid-France are some delightfully 
unspoiled sketching-grounds known not to the scorch- 
ing globe-trotter who jumps crazily about Europe 
from one great capital to another. 

The lower valley of the Loire, that of the Upper 
Seine and Marne and those of the Indre and the 
Cher are quite in a class by themselves. 

In the Department of the Creuze is a vast, purple, 
heather-blown plateau which has made the fame and 
fortune of Didier-Puget. He alone has made it the 
basis of his riots of colour on canvas, and the land 
will certainly be exploited by his followers, who may 
be expected to come quickly on his trail once his 
stamping ground is located. 

In the valley of the Yonne, an upper tributary 
of the Seine, at Joigny and Villeneuve, are little 
artist colonies of men and women working quietly 
away, unrecognised as yet by the world at large, 
but carving out for themselves something new, 
a thing which is difficult in these days of over- 
exploitation. 

Down along the shores of the Mediterranean, 
painters — those of a new school — have already be- 
gun to make themselves at home. They are seek- 
ing something different from the greenness of north- 
ern latitudes and are falling desperately in love with 
the parti-coloured marine life of the busy little ports, 
none the less than the white, dusty, cypress-lined 
roads, olive groves and a sad, morne aspect of earth's 



ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 425 

topography which is as much of the Near East as 
Greece or Arabia. 

First in favour among these French Mediterra- 
nean sketching-grounds is Martigues of fig-tree fame. 
Artists work here quartered in one or another of the 
town's three hotels, or, hermit-like, hide away in a 
cabanon in the hills, a tiny, windowless house set 




among vineyards and olive groves, as lonesome as 
the Sahara. 

On towards the Spanish frontier is the half-French 
and half-Spanish Collioure, quite at the end of the 
world as far as conventional travel goes, and withal 
a bit crude and uncouth, but a heaven for the artist. 
A step farther, almost into Spain this time, is Banyuls- 
sur-Mer, with a local colour which is remarkable 



426 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

from all counts, and especially so in the vintage time, 
when the town is overrun with Spanish muleteers, 
men and beasts covered with the gayest trappings 
one is likely to see outside of a circus. There are 
Catalan fishermen, too, and boats as gaudy as the 
mules, and there is an excellent hotel which, while 
lacking anything pretentious or even picturesque, 
knows well what it is that the artist wants, and so 
it is a sort of a Mecca for those who are in the know. 

Crossing into Spain one enters another sphere of 
unworldliness. The round is not to be described 
here in detail, but from Palamos in the cork forests, 
and quaint Gerona in the north, to Seville and Al- 
gecjras in the south are to be seen on every hand 
things for the artist to paint which may not be found 
out of Iberia. Then, too, there is Tangier, just 
across the Straits, in Africa, the nearest of all the 
painting grounds affected by the " Orientalistes." 

Wielders of the brush are looking forward to the 
exploitation of Valencia as a sketching-ground, since 
it is found that Sorolla used its beach as a background 
for the chief of his figure studies. Life here in the 
hot Spanish seaside sands is somewhat free and re- 
laxing, for all things in Spain relax with the heat, 
even custom, and not the least of all — etiquette. 
Spain sees nothing out of the ordinary in bathers 
undressing and dressing on the open beach, nor in 
the artist posing an " academic " model en plein 
soleil. Spanish artists in droves are hastening here 
to get in touch with the methods of the modern 
master. 



ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 427 

Around Marseilles is Cezanne's country. At the 
pottery town of Aubagne, backed up with the foot- 
hills of the Maritime Alps, at Estaque, at Allauch 
and in a dozen other little nearby corners of old 
Provence one sees Cezanne's motifs scarcely without 
looking for them. It was he who really gave this 
filip to a new school of art — the Provencal school, a 
method which is being carried on industriously by 
Galliardini, Montenard, Dauphine, Nardi, Olive 
and a dozen others, not to say the old-school master, 
Ziem, though he really belongs to the Venetian 
school, Provengal and Martigau though he be. 

Eastwards, towards the real Riviera of the tour- 
ists, there are to be found a half-dozen little exploited 
sketching-grounds between Toulon and Saint Tropez. 
There is Cap Brun, overlooking the great Rade de 
Toulon, a rival of Naples Bay in all things, and 
there is Carquieranne with its rocks and pines, until 
finally, going eastward by the coast, one sees the 
quaint Saracen tower of the church at Saint Tropez 
looming ahead. Here lives Paul Signac, the apostle 
of the newest of the new manners of painting, the 
president of " Les Independants," those secessionists 
from the old salon who have nearly upset the Paris 
art world. 

The town is half-aquatic, half-terrestrial, and, from 
the excellent Hotel Sube on the quay, one has scarcely 
to go the proverbial stone's throw to find motifs 
ready-made. There is the luxuriance of the lazy 
southerner's life in all its aspects forming groupings 
as fleeting as the clouds ever about, and there is 



428 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

as wonderful a panorama of the life of seamen in 
little Mediterranean coasting vessels as may be found 
between Gibraltar and the Piraeus. Saint Tropez 
indeed runs Martigues a close second in popular 
favour, and the excellence and variety of what it 
has to offer the artist with the facile brush. 

Art as well as trade follows the flag, and across 
the Mediterranean, in the French province of Al- 
geria, as much French as Algiers itself is a Little 
Paris, the best traditions of French art are being 
followed. At Bou Saada, away down in the Sahara, 
is an incipient sketching-ground. Here, under the 
protection of a French army post, easels are set up 
in the sands, and the attempt is being made to lure 
onto canvas the torrid, exotic charms of Sheiks 
wrapped in burnouses, and barbaric dancing girls in 
not much of anything at all. 

It is the little Hotel Bailie at Bou Saada that pro- 
tects the life of the painter here in this little desert 
town quite as much as the soldiery. It is not bad 
when the surroundings are considered, but according 
to European tastes it has its limitations in the food 
line. One eats first class with the officers or second 
class with the natives, lives at the hotel, or hires an 
adobe hut, with a servant to watch it, for the sum 
total of about a franc a day all told. Life is not 
particularly strenuous, but it is varied and would 
be a rather hard proposition for the woman painter 
who liked her ease. The diet is principally that of 
stewed goat and chicken, made into the national 
couscouss, and while filling and supposedly nutritious, 



ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 429 

is decidedly monotonous. The alternative is thin, 
scrawny chicken alone, chicken fattened principally 
on the sands of the desert. Meanwhile, the few 
artists that come to Bou Saada chuckle with glee. 
There is no danger of Bou Saada becoming too pop- 
ular, considering that its food supply is what it is, 
and that one has to ride two nights and a day in a 
stuffy, smelly, Arab-crowded diligence to get there. 

The artist tilts at the windmills of Holland with 
the impunity of a Don Quixote. The Pays Bas is a 
happy hunting ground for the painter. Holland, 
with its pines and dunes of the northern provinces, 
quaint customs and gay little houses, and Belgium, 
with its tree-lined canals and its low-roofed farm- 
houses, will strike a new note in many an artist's 
song of art. 

Dordrecht and its maze of canals is one of the best 
known of Holland's sketching-grounds. White um- 
brellas are as thick along the canal banks as are 
tubby boats on their surfaces. Almost any house- 
holder at Dordrecht will take in an artist and lodge 
and feed him in an ample and not too expensive 
fashion; some even have made over their lofts and 
attics into studios, looking to every white umbrella 
and painting kit that they see coming down the tow- 
path as a possible tenant. One thing they insist upon, 
these householders of Dordrecht, and that is that the 
painters whom they may shelter beneath their roofs 
shall not be allowed to plaster their palette scrapings 
on the walls. The Dutch housekeeper, with her 
passion for cleanliness, absolutely refuses to take as 



43Q THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

an excuse the fact that the procedure is custom im- 
memorial and comes as a natural consequence of the 
artistic temperament. 

Laren is a tiny Dutch village which is the capital 
of Mauve's country. Here come his disciples in 
droves to copy, as near as may be, the style of the 
Dutch landscapist. Israels, too, had not a little to 
do with making Laren famous. All these artists' 
sketching-grounds have some tutelary genius who is 
the prime drawing attraction, the central sun around 
which the lesser lights revolve, but here there were 
two arcs, or at least a sun and a moon. 

It may be a question as to whether Dordrecht or 
Volendam, the latter on a tiny island in the Zuyder 
Zee, is the chief of Dutch sketching-grounds. The 
English and American elements seem to prefer Volen- 
dam, and it is they who have made most of the 
profits for Spaander's little red-roofed, red-walled 
inn. The thrifty Dutchman saw the wave of pros- 
perity coming long years ago, and has even fitted 
up a studio where one may work indoors. 

At Volendam, which one reaches by boat from the 
mainland, one sees the quaintest and most nearly un- 
spoiled of all the old-time Dutch costumes, those of 
the women and girls being, if not the most remark- 
able, at least the most attractve, tight-fitting white 
caps with spreading wings on either side, short- 
sleeved bodices and voluminous skirts. 

Mynheer Spaander's little inn is not in the dollar-a- 
day class; it is expensive, and costs four or five 
florins a day, whereas the same accommodation could 



ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 431 

have been had in a former day for half as much. 
Models can be had cheaply enough, for the frugal 
Dutch still consider that money earned in this way, 
with no apparent expenditure of energy, as light 
work and accordingly profitable — the idea of being 
paid for doing nothing. It is much better than 
being harnessed to a tow-line and pulling heavy boats 
along canals or carrying two heavy brass jugs full 
of milk, three or four gallons to each, across the 
shoulders, swung on the end of a pole. 

The old Flemish city of Bruges entertains a cos- 
mopolitan crowd of artists each year. A five-franc- 
a-day rate is possible at certain hotels, for Belgium 
is cheap on all hands. At the Hotel de Flandre and 
the Hotel du Commerce are sure to be found a very 
considerable artist clientele in summer, but if you are 
not wary you will be charged more than the others 
if you are a late comer. The artist's life here may 
be made very enjoyable, and there is a specious 
variety of paintable things about Bruges' deserted 
old squares and its solitary canal banks which are 
as much of yesterday as to-day. 

The artistic life of England is much more con- 
ventional than that of the Continent. It runs in 
oiled grooves almost as easily as an ordinary exist- 
ence, for the English soil is not suitable to the giving 
root to Bohemianism, an eccentric plant which re- 
quires a peculiar form of foothold in order to flourish 
at its best. Bohemianism in England died out with 
those giants of English art who founded its great- 
est school of outdoor painting — Moreland, who 



432 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

swapped his masterpieces at horse-trading and drank 
away his art appreciation in carousing with pot-boys, 
and others of his ilk and time. The life of those 
who pursue art in England to-day is as well-ordered 
in outward appearances as that of a country gentle- 
man. 

England has some charming sketching-grounds, 
but they are exploited on conservative lines, and only 
patronised to any extent by the English themselves. 
A cosmopolitan atmosphere is wanting, and the only 
section that has anything of an international reputa- 
tion is the Cornish coast. Here the mild winter 
climate and the paintable qualities of the rugged, 
storm-swept shore have attracted many artists, so that 
they have formed themselves into groups and colo- 
nies and given to Cornwall, the Land's End of Eng- 
land, a world-wide fame which it never would have 
known otherwise. 

The trade of the fisherman seems always to have 
a great fascination for the picture maker, and the 
south coast fishing villages of Saint Ives, Penzance 
and Polperro, afford glimpses of him at work which 
are unequalled. 

Saint Ives is the nucleus of an artists' colony, and 
as journeys to London are long and expensive, most 
of its members have built comfortable houses with 
studio attachments and settled down. 

These same painters were responsible for the 
booming of Saint Ives as a resort, for their pictures 
first drew the outside world thither, and coming for 
curiosity, first to see, they stayed on because they 



ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 433 



liked it and could hang on to the fringe of a life 

which was so different from their own. The artists 

first deplored this popularity, but found it profitable 

to rent their studio-houses in summer to the people 

who came from out 

their own sphere, 

and hie themselves 

away to Continental 

sketching - grounds, 

coming back to 

paint the mists and 

storms of winter 

when the crowds 

had gone. 

The fisher peo- 
ple of Saint Ives 
resented the coming 
of the artists as a 
pertinent intrusion, 
of which they did 
not the least under- 
stand the purport. 

When easels were first planted before the grey-slated 
walls and roofs of the fishermen's cottages not a few 
were bowled over, but the artists persevering, the 
native got used to the procedure and went about his 
work as of yore, which was exactly what the artists 
wanted most. To-day many a fisherman and woman 
of the early days has forsaken their former trade to 
become a model at a more lucrative wage. 

In Kent and Sussex and Surrey are charming old 




The. Englishwoman 

Turns To Art - 



434 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

Georgian architectural groupings posed quaintly in 
the midst of wold and rolling downs. In the his- 
toric old coast town of Rye, one of the celebrated 
" Cinq Ports," one gets a really foreign composition 
and colouring, the most " foreign " combination to 
be seen in all England, the roofs and gables of the 
town in all their variety and quaintness being in 
strong contrast to that usual variety of English 
background which one associates with leafy lanes, 
whimsically pretty rivers or Norman Keeps and 
Castles. 

There is a Sussex school of art, as there is a Glas- 
gow school of art, but in the southern county the 
background composes itself of green-topped chalk 
cliffs instead of misty braes and burns peopled with 
long-horned cattle as in wild Caledonia. 

Up in East Anglia, as the east coast of England 
is familiarly known, is Constable's country. Here 
was really originated that free and large method of 
outdoor painting which was later so highly devel- 
oped across the Channel at Barbizon. 

Great cumulus clouds still sweep over the land- 
scape of East Anglia as they did in Constable's time. 
There are lazily turning, decrepit old windmills still, 
and there are the classic " Oaks " and " Mills " and 
" Hay Wains." Little is changed in general out- 
lines from what it was generations ago except the 
public taste, and this is the real reason why the East 
Anglian school of painting no longer ranks high. 
Surroundings and accessories are much as they were. 
Modernity has not tempered the atmosphere — nor 



ARTISTS' SKETCHING-GROUNDS ABROAD 435 

the climate, nor changed the slow-going methods of 
life of a bucolic population. 

Crome and Cotman, too, worked not far away, 
and Norfolk and its Broads and their famous 
wherries form an interlude in landscape composition 
which is not to be met with elsewhere. They are 
still moving incidents in a pageantry which has not 
quickened its pace for centuries. 

One cannot ignore the charming little artists' vil- 
lage of Broadway, least of all an American, for here 
first settled the late Edwin A. Abbey and Frank D. 
Millet, two Americans who have led the best tradi- 
tional methods of the New World across the seas 
and, as one may put it, made them flourish on an 
alien soil. For this reason hundreds, thousands 
doubtless, perhaps tens of thousands, have already 
paid their respects to this shrine of art. 




^Sxvli&er/an 



A WINTER PLAYGROUND 

" WINTER SPORTS " FOR WINTER TOURISTS 

A FORTNIGHT AT ST. MORITZ 

ON ALPINE SKATING RINKS 

SWISS WINTER HOTELS 

INTERNATIONAL SPORTS 

SWITZERLAND A CENTRE FOR WINTER SPORTS 

WINTER AMUSEMENTS ELSEWHERE 

PIONEER WINTER RESORTS 

WINTER SEASON IN THE SWISS ALPS 

SKI-RUNNING 

CAUX FAVORS THE " BOB SLED " 

MONTREUX THE TOURISTS' CAPITAL 

CENSUS OF WINTER VISITORS 

IN THE ENGADINE 

WINTER SPORTS FOR THE WOMAN 

COST OF FUN AMONG ALPINE SNOWS 

MODERN BOB SLEIGH 

TOBOGGANING AT ST. MORITZ 

CRESTA " BOB SLED " RUN 

CLUB DUES AT ST. MORITZ 

KLOSTERS' DANGEROUS CURVE 

KEEPING UP AN ICE RINK 



XVIII 

WINTER SPORTS IN SWITZERLAND 

Why not Switzerland and be done with it, we asked 
ourselves one glacial January morning when our 
Paris studio " cloche " had gone out over night and 
the water pipes had frozen tight and all but burst? 
The sun does sometimes shine brightly there in win- 
ter and the snow is hard under foot, and, we were 
told, the hotels were most comfortable with calori- 
feres and great wood logs ablaze in the hooded 
chimneys, and " hot and cold " laid on, as our Eng- 
lish cousins have it, referring to the water of their 
baths. In Paris we had scarcely seen the sun for 
four weeks — fog, rain, more rain and more fog; and 
now a freeze with the prospect of a muddy, sticky 
thaw which would hold on another month. 

We had known what it was to freeze in mid- 
August beside the Rhone Glacier: midwinter couldn't 
be colder, and those super-heated hotels and the sun- 
shiny climate appealed to us greatly. 

At the Paris office of the Swiss Federal Railways 
an employee gave us a skeleton map, traced our route 
in blue pencil and made up our ticket in accordance 
with our vagaries. 

We left the Engadine Express the next morning 
at Bale, leaving the rest of our fellow-voyagers to 

439 



44Q THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

go on to Davos, Coire and Saint Moritz whilst we 
dropped down to the shores of Lac Leman (which 
a former generation called erroneously Lake Geneva) 
at Montreux, and at midday were taking our coffee 
on the open-air terrace of a great hotel in a warmth 
and brilliance that was tropical after Paris' winter 
gloom. Snow and ice, hard-packed, were all about 
us, not only on the distant mountain peaks and slopes 
but in the streets of the town as well, and a hard, 
glassy surface covered the little lake at Les Avants 
up back of the town. 

" Winter sport " is the new-coined, hyphenated 
nomenclature for the divertisements of what was for- 
merly accepted as the dull winter months. The sig- 
nificance of the word is known from the Trossachs to 
Tyrol, from the Alps of Switzerland to the purple 
Pyrenees of the Basque Provinces and from Norway 
to Roussilon. The bark toboggan of the red Indian 
gives place to the Swiss variety, the luge and the 
bob-sled, and the snow-shoe and the " crosse " to the 
ski and the curling stone, hockey and bandy. Most 
of the sports are, as is obvious, importations from 
other lands. 

Skating on artificially made rinks may be obtained 
in almost all parts, and frequently on natural lakes 
which are kept in the best of condition. Notably 
this applies to that chain of lakes between Saint 
Moritz and the Maloja Pass; those of Silvaplana and 
the Silsersee, though the latter are of such great depth 
that they freeze over only late in the season. 

From Paris to Saint Moritz for a fortnight, in- 



WINTER SPORTS IN SWITZERLAND 441 

eluding everything needful for one's comfort and en- 
joyment, transportation (second class), food, lodging 
and a participation in such sports as strike one's 
fancy, ought not to exceed three hundred francs (sixty 
dollars) , and for a month not more than five hundred 
francs (one hundred dollars). It may look a round 
figure to pay but the expense of getting there and 
back is included, for Switzerland is not exactly at 
our front door, even if we do live in Paris, and at 
least one hundred and twenty-five francs of this ex- 
pense is for railway fares. 

At Adelboden, a newly-opened resort, you may get 
an inclusive rate that will cover a ticket out and 
back from London or Paris and a stay of a certain 
length with nothing to pay once you have regulated 
the price of the account presented when you buy 
your ticket. You lose a good deal of your freedom 
of action, some personal pride and, maybe, seriously 
inconvenience yourself by such a procedure, but you 
may expect to gain twenty per cent on the total cost, 
which is something in these days of high prices — 
and they are still soaring upward even in Switzer- 
land. 

A curious phase of the cost of hotel living in 
Switzerland is that in many places it is more costly 
in winter than in summer. With everything snowed- 
up and the conditions of transport and distribution 
more difficult, this readily explains itself with respect 
to food and drink. What is not so readily explained 
is that in Switzerland, summer and winter alike, the 
casual traveller often pays as much for a single meal 



442 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

as does a pensionnaire for his food and lodging for 
the round of the clock. That Switzerland is a nation 
of hotel keepers, and successful ones at that, is the 
only possible explanation. 

Another considerable item of expense in the run- 
ning of a Swiss hotel in winter is that of heating and 
lighting, for nowhere else among the resorts of 
Europe is so much attention paid to the heating of 
hotel public rooms and private apartments as in this 
land of mountains. One is not cold indoors here in 
the heart of the Alps in winter, and the still, out-of- 
door cold (even should the bise be howling) is not 
to be feared with proper clothing protection, for there 
is absolutely no dampness. On account of the high 
winds which frequently blow down off the Maloja 
Pass there are fewer consumptives at Saint Moritz, 
which is farther away, than at Davos, and for that 
reason is to be preferred as a headquarters in the 
Engadine. 

Bad weather in Switzerland in winter usually means 
snowy weather and thus it continues until the season 
of spring rains sets in. Snow seldom brings a tem- 
perature below freezing; and when this — either the 
clear, dry, still cold, or the dry, bracing wind and 
hillocks of drifting snow — is found in conjunction 
with bright sunshine, the combination is very attrac- 
tive indeed. 

The English have sought to introduce into Switzer- 
land as winter sports football and hockey. For the 
latter there is some excuse, for played on the ice it 
becomes " bandy," but for the former it is as ridicu- 



WINTER SPORTS IN SWITZERLAND 443 

lous as if it were cricket or baseball. The Scotch 
game of curling is also extensively played, and for 
this, too, there is some reason for being since it is 
played upon ice. Skating is of two varieties in 
Switzerland — the English and the Continental styles. 
They differ greatly and seldom are the two practised 
in any one resort. The Dutchmen are the best 
European skaters, but not many come to Switzerland 
— they are too frugal a race to spend their money 
excursioning. By contrast it is the English figure 
skater who is most often seen on the newly flooded 
rinks, even before Christmas, when the snow sports 
of winter, the chief of which is " bob-sleighing," be- 
gins in the Swiss mountains. 

Switzerland is the head centre of les sports d'hiver, 
more than fifty stations being devoted to them, The 
game is an international one, however, so far as par- 
ticipation therein is concerned, and even France, in 
the Vosges, the Alps of Dauphiny and Savoy and in 
the Pyrenean provinces, has succumbed and has seri- 
ously taken up with the new idea as a means of 
attracting winter tourists to places that hitherto were 
bereft from November to May. The mountain 
regions of central Europe are no longer merely sum- 
mer playgrounds. In Styria, Tyrol and elsewhere 
in Austria, winter sport has taken on immensely well 
also. At Chamonix and certain spots in the Vosges 
an initiative is to be remarked, though in general the 
French Alpine resort authorities say: " Give us the 
clientele and we will establish winter hotels, rinks 
and toboggan runs." The winter tourist is apt to 



444 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 



reason otherwise and reply, " Give us the conveni- 
ences and the divertissements which we demand and 
we will come." And so it is that Switzerland has 
won out. 

The former Alpine sport of Whymper's and Sir 
Martin Conway's day is giving way to bob-sleighing, 
lugeing and skiing, as was destiny when the flanks 
of the Jungfrau and Mont Blanc came to be pene- 
trated by cog-wheel railways. Only the eidelweiss 
is left of the Switzerland of old, that sacred, star- 
shaped flower which is a paternoster in the religion 
of the montagnard of Switzerland and Austria. The 
diligence has not wholly disappeared, but it is only 
in the Canton of Grisons and on the Furka, Grimsel 

and Oberlap Passes 
that the drivers are 
safe from surprise 
by some mad, rush- 
ing automobilist. 

As far back as 
1882 the proprietor 
of the Kulm Hotel 
at Saint Moritz de- 
cided to leave his 
latch string out all 
winter. Up to that 
time Switzerland's 
season had been 
summer; since that time it has run from the rise of 
the first to the decline of the year's last moon and 
the prosperity of the Swiss hotel keeper has pro- 




WINTER SPORTS IN SWITZERLAND 445 

gressed in the same ratio, Davos, Saint Moritz and 
Grindelwald being the pioneer winter resorts. 

The winter season is not long, for except in the 
highest stations, it scarcely begins before January and 
is over by March. The majority of stations at a 
greater elevation than three thousand feet have the 
shortest season and begin to empty towards the end 
of January, their height of attraction being around 
Christmas time, though the ideal month for ski- 
running is undoubtedly February. By ski-running is 
meant long excursions on skis, a climb upwards some 
two thousand feet or more above the hotel-peopled 
slopes and valleys, in company with a Swiss guide. 
There one rests in some Alpine club hut, lunches and 
swoops down again like a bird on swift-gliding skis 
over the virgin snow and under a sun as vivid as if 
one were on the shores of the Mediterranean instead 
of those of Lac Leman. This really makes skiing 
worth while, though most who affect the sport merely 
hop about before the terraces of the hotels and hurry 
back for a " hot scotch " or tea at frequent in- 
tervals. 

To-day the season at Chateau d'Oex, at Les 
Avants above Montreux, at Davos and Saint Moritz 
in Grisons, at Disentis, at Grindelwald, at Diablerets, 
Champery, Montana, Kanderstag, Adelboden and 
Engelberg is quite as much a winter season as a 
summer one. The hotels are most nearly full in 
winter and it is then that one pays the highest prices 
for accommodations. It is open house now all the 
year round in most of the high Alpine valleys of 



446 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

hotel-keeping, tourist Switzerland. The air is pure, 
clear and cold, the sun hot in the valleys for a brief 
moment at midday from before Christmas until the 
end of February, and one is as comfortable without 
wraps here as in a latitude many hundreds of miles 
further south. At sundown, which may be at two or 
three o'clock in the afternoon if a high mountain in- 
tervenes to the southwest, all is glacial, and what little 
thaw there may have been on the skating ponds, 
the skiing ground and the toboggan runs congeals 
again for the morrow's sport. Sometimes, even, it is 
a moonlight game, this winter sport of Switzerland, 
and sometimes a ten or twenty mile sleigh-ride by 
night is a variation. But usually it is a case of tea 
and dinner and bridge and a hot grog and then to 
bed in the great white palaces of the Alpine slopes 
overlooking some silent, glassy valley or the cold 
blue-grey of Leman's Lake. 

The Engadine, the Oberland and the High Valley 
of the Rhone are a very cinematograph of life and 
movement in winter. Here are new worlds to con- 
quer for the conventional traveller who has previously 
done Switzerland only in summer or Algeria in win- 
ter. Things should be reversed, the latter in May 
or September and the former in January will give one 
a new outlook on things. 

At Caux, which the former tourist ignored, are 
now great hotels with bob-sleigh garages, which are 
as much a necessary adjunct to this modern twentieth 
century life as an automobile garage in a main road 
town. A three kilometre run, commencing at the 



WINTER SPORTS IN SWITZERLAND 447 

Cret d'y Bau high up in the mountains, finishes at 
the very door of the Palace Hotel. How desirable 
an attraction the run and its attendant line of trucks 
to take the coasters up hill again was thought to be 
by the hotel administration is best realised when it 
is stated that its upkeep costs annually fifty thousand 
francs. Besides this there is a run for luges, or 
single sleds, and two ice rinks. Caux is a winter 
rival of Luna Park and considerably more exclusive 
and luxurious. 

On Mont Pelerin, above Vevey, a similar enter- 
prise, with the addition of a skiing ground, has come 
into being. Meanwhile trade follows the flag and 
the Swiss are so happy that they have got an all-the- 
year-round occupation that they are no longer emi- 
grating. 

Some one once wrote an anthology of prose and 
verse describing the delights of Switzerland under all 
its varied aspects and at all seasons. It ran from 
Gesner to Longfellow, Rosseau to the Williamsons — ■ 
who wrote the " Lightning Conductor." There was 
Miss Braddon and John Ruskin and others. It was 
a good anthology as anthologies go, but whilst spring, 
summer, autumn and winter, sky and lake and moun- 
tain were all pictured, practically nothing was said of 
winter sport. 

Chateaubriand was about the only one among these 
contributors who did not laud the praises of the 
mountains. He protested that mountains fatigued 
one to the point where he could not philosophise 
going up, and that one's natural fear when coming 



448 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

down so monopolised attention that nothing else mat- 
tered. 

This is not the point of view of the lover of 
winter sports of the mountains as they have been 
developed in the Switzerland of to-day. Just what 
it means to Switzerland to have all four seasons full 
ones is best realised by the contemplation of a few 
statistics. Montreux, for instance, is a town of 
hotels of all ranks and conditions and full at all 
seasons. Visitors have increased fifty per cent in 
five years, partly because of the quality and quantity 
of the hotel accommodation offered, partly because of 
its accessibility and proximity to the multifarious, all- 
round amusements of that part of Switzerland of 
which it is the stranger's capital. 

Switzerland's tourists are, like its speech, princi- 
pally German. Out of each thousand of its hotel 
dwellers three hundred and ten are Teutons, two 
hundred and twenty-two are Swiss themselves, one 
hundred and thirty-five English, and one hundred and 
ten Americans. The list tails off with twenty-four 
Italians and eighteen Austrians, with the French, 
Russians, Hollanders and Belgians in between. In 
the winter season Americans and English seem to 
predominate, and the former are quite as much in 
evidence as the latter, if not actually in numbers, 
at least in appearance. That is a question of na- 
tional temperament one may rightly suppose; the 
American is usually in evidence wherever he may be. 
The Germans come to Montreux mostly in the spring. 
To nineteen thousand Germans in 1909 there were 



WINTER SPORTS IN SWITZERLAND 449 

six thousand two hundred and twenty-seven Ameri- 
cans. The French come chiefly in August, as do the 
cheap trippers from London, bound to or from the 
Oberland or the Engadine. During the same year 
forty thousand strangers stayed at, or passed through, 
Montreux, those who actually stopped there for any 
length of time being those who came for the winter 
sports. 

It is not dull travelling in Switzerland in winter, 
not even by contrast with what one may have known 
of it on some summer journey. A deep blanket of 
snow is everywhere, and the Jungfrau and the Wen- 
gernalp, Mont Cervin at Zermatt and old Mont Blanc 
itself (which is not in Switzerland but in France) , are 
a few shades whiter with the snow deeper on their 
lower slopes; that is all. 

By the wonderful Albula railway one reaches Saint 
Moritz in winter with the sensation of a locomotive 
and its following train skating on ice. Before the 
line was opened (from Thusis to Saint Moritz) it 
was a matter of two or three days getting into the 
Engadine over the Julier Pass. The former method, 
in a great sleigh with from three to six horses, was 
picturesque and amusing but inconvenient. It was 
so in Robert Louis Stevenson's day, when he and the 
boy Lloyd printed those famous little " Davos Book- 
lets " now worth their weight in gold. To-day by a 
train-de-luxe one travels more quickly, more com- 
fortably, and takes his, or her, winter sport at the 
journey's end rather than in the joy and adventure 
of getting there. 



450 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

The coming of the railway to the Engadine has 
meant the coming of the crowds, and even the aspect 
of the visitors has changed. To-day they are more 
transitory than formerly. If on a former winter's 
day at Saint Moritz or Davos you met a party group 
that you saw there a month before, you thought 
nothing of it; to-day, but thirty-six hours later, the 
same party may be met at Montreux, at Aigle, at 
Sierra or Montana. Winter sport in Switzerland is 
a sort of movable sport. You bundle up your skis 
as you did your umbrella and your alpenstock on a 
summer tour, and after the Engadine has palled, 
make your way to Grindelwald, and luge, and ski and 
skate amid a new environment until the spirit warns 
you to move on again. 

Swiss winter sports are as much for women as for 
men, for though they are vigorous and bespeak agility 
on the part of the players, as well as a love of the 
open, they are in comport with the new order of 
things which has come to recognise the virtues of 
exercise and fresh air. Such as go to Switzerland 
in winter enjoy great advantages over those who put 
in their time at the merely fashionable resorts of the 
Riviera or the tepid, tea-drinking winter colonies 
of Cairo and Biskra. Routine gives place to free- 
dom of movement and unconventionally, inanition 
to exercise, and frills and furbelows to sensible 
and practical health-giving, health-sustaining cos- 
tumes. 

An outfit for Switzerland in winter is easily and 
cheaply conceived, and if of the quality that it ought 



WINTER SPORTS IN SWITZERLAND 451 

to be it will possess a durability that will assure it long 
service. 

The winter days are short in Switzerland and the 
evenings long, so if one wants to mix social flippancies 
with lusty exercise, she may still have the opportunity 
to don frocks of fashion at the musical evenings, 
dances and bridge parties of the great steam-heated, 
electric-lighted, palatial hotels which are now found 
in close proximity to the half a hundred winter-sports 
stations of the country. 

One may not do the round of all these winter re- 
sorts in ten days, but the point is that whereas winter 
visitors to Switzerland usually stayed weeks, they 
now come for a ten-day plunge into the clear, cold, 
rarefied atmosphere at some of the great resorts whose 
attractions have been widely advertised, and go back 
again to Paris, to Dresden or to London, their lungs 
and hearts full of new vigour and emotions. 

Davos, Klosters, Landquart, Coire, Thusis, Cresta 
and Saint Moritz were but vague, humble place- 
names a generation ago, but to-day, taking Saint 
Moritz and its Grand Hotel as an example (it offers 
four hundred beds to visitors), their fame is some- 
what more considerable. At the foot of the Cresta 
snow run is Celerina, with another newly opened 
enormous caravansary, on whose open ice rink is held 
the English Public Schools Skating Championship for 
the Challenge Cup now held by Malvern College. 

Here in the upper Engadine, chiefly on that chain 
of lakes extending from Samaden to Maloja, at an 
elevation approximating six thousand feet, skating is 



452 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

at its best. Artificially made rinks are everywhere, 
too, water being flowed over depressions in the frozen 
ground and they, as well, for the less venturesome 
skaters, fill a want. 

In the most popular of the Swiss winter resorts 
one pays on an average of twelve francs, say two dol- 
lars and forty cents a day, and the pursuing of the 
sports themselves is a cheap enough amusement. The 
cheapest are skiing, skating and tobogganing. For 
these one pays a small sum, varying from a half a 
franc for a seance to two or three francs for a day's 
sport on the specially prepared tracks or rinks. Bob- 
sleighing costs a good bit more, rising from twenty to 
fifty francs, four dollars to ten dollars a day, an 
expense which would naturally be divided among 
several. 

The " bob-sled," as it is known in Switzerland to- 
day, was originally imported from the United States 
in 1889; at least it developed from a species of 
" double-runner " which, by the time it had crossed 
the ocean and climbed up into the high Alps, had 
become known as a " pig-sticker." The modern 
" bob-sleigh " is scientifically constructed and is a 
thing of four spring runners, much hardware trap- 
ping in the form of hand rails, foot rests, steering- 
gear and the like, and possesses a general business- 
like air which would seem to make the conduct of 
it more a profession than a sport. The name of 
Mathis of Saint Moritz or Beek of Davos on the 
dashboard of a " bob," is what Renault or Panhard 
is on an automobile. 



WINTER SPORTS IN SWITZERLAND 453 

Sleighing in general is even more expensive, par- 
ticularly with respect to lengthy excursions, but again 
this is a sort of community affair and ought not to 
cost the individual more than a dollar a day, say 
thirty per cent more than the " bob-sleigh." 

One of the most popular of these Swiss sleigh 
excursions is from Samaden, through Saint Moritz 




and Silvaplana, to Sils and Maloja and their deep 
water lakes. The lakes, though often freezing to 
a depth of three solid feet, crackle and detonate like 
a cannonade as one glides over their surface. 
" Crackling ice is the safest," is, however, an axiom 
that holds good in the Engadine. 

For a dozen or fifteen miles from Samaden the 
narrow ribbon of the post road winds up to the table 



454 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

land from whence, a little beyond Maloja, it plunges 
off into the Lombard plain of Italy. Those to whom 
the skating is not the prime object of the excursion 
may climb the height back of the town, see the won- 
derful, wide-spread panorama for themselves and still 
get back to the Bernina hostelry at Samaden to sleep. 

Taking Saint Moritz as a centre, tobogganing is 
usually practised in the morning before the sun has 
melted the ruts of the coast into holes. The 
" bandy " game is an afternoon amusement. It is 
only in February that " bob-sleighing " is at its height, 
and at Saint Moritz it has a special track lying paral- 
lel to the famous Cresta toboggan run. " Bobbing," 
as it is called, is also an afternoon sport and is quite 
the most social, and perhaps the most dangerous, 
of all. 

A steersman and brakeman are the only really 
skilled and sporty individuals of a " bob-sled's " crew. 
The rest, fellows and girls, are sandwiched in be- 
tween, on the plank of this refined double-runner, and 
are told simply to sit tight, and if a spill comes to 
devitalise themselves that they may suffer no broken 
bones nor run the risk of being killed. They are 
the ballast of the craft; those at either end the crew. 
The word " bob " thus applied comes from the 
swinging backwards and forwards by the crew and 
the ballast whilst coasting, a movement not unlike that 
of the crew of a four- or eight-oared shell. 

The Cresta " bob-sled " run is supposedly the finest 
in existence. It was scientifically built to begin with 
and is kept in the best of condition. An American 



WINTER SPORTS IN SWITZERLAND 455 

once steered a " bob " over the entire length of the 
run, including all its high-banked curves, one thou- 
sand four hundred and fifty yards, in sixty-three sec- 
onds, and that is not far from fifty miles an hour. 
Why, it's the next thing to aeroplaning! 

The Schatz-Alp " bob-sled " course at Davos is 
over two miles long, with many sharp curves. A 
snow course offers the best opportunity for display- 
ing the skill of the steersman of a " bob " and is less 
fraught with danger in the case of an overturn than 
an ice run. There is one "spill-over" curve, virtu- 
ally a great horse-shoe, on the Schatz-Alp run, which 
would be reckoned a marvel of engineering if it was 
an adjunct of a dirt-built road. Then there is the 
" made run," iced practically throughout its length, 
and banked so high at the corners that it is almost 
impossible for any self-respecting " bob " to shoot 
off comet-like into space, though the thing has been 
known. 

At Klosters, on a course nearly two miles in length, 
is another famous curve known as the " Cabbage 
Garden," which sees frequent spills and some really 
dangerous accidents. It was at Klosters a half a 
century ago — at the instigation of John Addington 
Symonds, old stagers will tell you — that the Swiss 
variety of toboggan came into being. For a fact, the 
toboggan has more or less evolved itself into the 
" bob-sled," but by the way of the American double- 
runner. 

The Saint Moritz International Skating Club is a 
formally organised and elaborately constituted insti- 



456 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

tution. Formerly one became a member by the pay- 
ment of a five-franc fee, became a life member in 
fact. To-day things are different. It is a much 
more serious affair. One now pays an annual sub- 
scription of ten francs for merely becoming a member 
of the club for a season, and this only if staying at 
one of the hotels which is a party to the organisation. 
If you lodge elsewhere the subscription is doubled to 
twenty francs. For this one has the use of a private, 
superbly kept ice rink, so the charge by no manner 
of reckoning can be called an onerous one. 

The keeping up of a Swiss ice rink is a costly and 
continuous performance. The slightest fall of snow 
has to be swept, or scraped, from the surface before it 
freezes into roughness or hummocks, a labour which, 
curiously enough, is, in many places in the Engadine, 
performed by sunny-faced condottieri from Italy who 
at other seasons work at railway building or grape 
picking in the vineyards of Piedmont. 

SOME SWISS WINTER RESORTS AND THEIR ALTITUDES 



Adelboden 

Andermatt 

Celerina . 

Champery 

Diablerets 

Engelberg 

Gastaad . 

Grindelwald 

Goldiwill 



4,500 feet 

4,738 " 

5,577 " 
3,5°° 
3,940 

3,300 

3,490 " 

3,468 " 

3,H7 " 



WINTER SPORTS IN SWITZERLAND 457 



Kanderstag 
Klosters . 
Lauterbrunnen 
Saanen 
Samaden . 
Saint Moritz . 
Wengen . 
Waldhaus-Flims 
Zweisimmen 



3,835 feet 

4,090 

2,625 

3.773 
5,670 

6,090 

4,190 

3>7°° 
3. 2 i5 




g%PWOM AN Qg/2^£ 




THREE WAYS OF MOTORING ABROAD 
RESOURCEFUL WOMAN TRAVELLER 
TWO MOTORING BOGEYS 
THE WOMAN'S IDEAL TOUR 
MOTORIST SEES A NEW EUROPE 
GETTING ACQUAINTED WITH EUROPE 
AUTOMOBILE SIMPLIFIES TOURING 
COST OF TOURING BY MOTOR CAR 
HISTORY REPEATS ITSELF 
HIRING A CAR ABROAD 
LUXURIOUS TRAVEL BY AUTOMOBILE 
RESPONSIBILITY OF JEWELS 
COMPARATIVE MERITS OF CHAUFFEURS 
MOTORING IN THE BRITISH ISLES 
FRANCE, THE MOTORIST'S PARADISE 
COUNTRY INNS AND THE AUTOMOBILE 
SPAIN PRESENTS DIFFICULTIES 
INHOSPITABLE SWITZERLAND 
SPEED SLOWS DOWN ACROSS THE ALPS 
AS THE MOTORIST SEES ITALY 
ABOUT THE ITALIAN LAKES 



XIX 

THE WOMAN AND THE CAR 

There are three ways of seeing Europe from an 
automobile — to take over one's own car and chauffeur; 
to hire an automobile and chauffeur, or to depend on 
short, circular tours, from certain centres, where a 
hotel or some enterprising tourist agency provides 
automobile runs about the neighbourhood, varying 
from a day to a week, all included. This last is the 
most feasible plan for many, for everything is 
arranged without effort on the part of the traveller; it 
is the modern means of extending the radius of the 
old-time local carriage drive, which still adds to the 
time and costliness of sight-seeing in many localities. 

This latter arrangement often affords just about 
as much motoring as many women want — for as a 
class they are not hardy motorists; it bears, however, 
about the same relation to real automobile touring 
as a sandwich does to a course dinner. The obvious 
reply is that one might just as well take the sandwich 
if she can't get the dinner, but perhaps if the woman, 
who has been so resourceful in getting about in other 
ways, will turn her ingenuity to the question of travel 
by automobile she will perhaps be able to get the 
dinner made up of a dish from each leading nation. 

Two bogeys discourage travel by automobile for 
461 



462 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

the woman abroad. One is that supposedly it can- 
not readily be done without male escort, and the other 
that it is too expensive for the average touring allow- 
ance. 

As to the first, for say three or four, it is the 
woman's ideal way of touring. Here is the possible 
way of gaining that exclusiveness that so many women 
crave, and as for protection, she does no more need 
a man along than does the twenty-five or forty horse- 
power car need a real horse to increase its effective- 
ness. 

To probe deeper into the subject, one questions 
how much women really care for touring by auto- 
mobile, that is, real touring, rising early, keeping at 
it all day, being delayed for meals occasionally, 
spending half the night by the roadside on that day 
when every one of the tires blow out with unanimity. 
This is a bit different from using the big touring car 
for running around town or out to the country club, 
as so often is the limit of the practice at home. 

In a few words, motoring, which is popularly sup- 
posed to be such a luxurious sport, calls for a lot of 
endurance and staying qualities, and quickly weeds 
out the pseudo-traveller and shows up the sporty char- 
acteristics of the woman who cares for things for 
their own sakes and not just because they are the 
fashion. 

The automobile has opened up a new Europe. It 
is like following " Alice Through the Looking-Glass " 
and entering a land, surprised to find it real, which 
seemed always not unlike an imaginary, painted 



THE WOMAN AND THE CAR 463 

panorama, viewed as it usually had been through the 
dusty frame of the window of a flying train. The 
lesson is being learned that by means of the facile 
automobile is the only way to see a country; more 
than this — it's the only way for the passing traveller 
to ever get to know a foreign land. 

One can never know Europe intimately until she 
has felt the joy of the open road, reeled off at least 
some considerable length of the long, straight, won- 
derful roads of France, has glided along under the 
shadow of the Rhine castles, followed by the side of 
Dutch and Flemish canals, braved the dangers of an 
inhospitable Swiss pass, and the almost equally dan- 
gerous leafy lanes of England, the dust and pictur- 
esqueness of Italian highroads, and has followed in 
the trail of the camel over the desert sands to Biskra. 
Such experiences will tend to place the English-speak- 
ing pension, with its banal chit-chat, in its true posi- 
tion in the scheme of things abroad, and give one a 
broader and more comprehensive understanding of 
foreign things. 

For that most industrious traveller — the American 
woman with two or three months at her disposal — 
the automobile is invaluable as a means of covering 
ground and sight-seeing at the same time. 

All the methods of procedure set forth above are 
to be considered, but perhaps the most practical is 
to hire a car abroad, though if the woman wishes 
to take her own car and chauffeur, which, in her case, 
is better than depending on the foreign driver, it is 
even a less expensive arrangement than to hire the 



464 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

same combination on the other side if one's time ex- 
tends beyond three months, for say five or six. 

Four women, a car and a chauffeur can tour the 
motorist's Europe for one thousand dollars a month, 
comfortably and easily, including the cost of ocean 
transport. Carefully figure up the approximate cost 




of the ordinary tour for that same period, and the 
chances are that the motor trip will not figure up 
appreciably higher than the other. Two hundred 
and fifty dollars a month is about as close a margin 
on which any but an exceedingly knowing and care- 
ful person can travel on day after day by automobile 
in Europe, visiting all the stock sights, big and little, 



THE WOMAN AND THE CAR 465 

This necessitates of course that finances be studied and 
that there be no leakages. The thing that mostly 
affects the cost of the automobile tour abroad is the 
disposition everywhere to put motorists in a class by 
themselves and make them pay for this distinction. 
Motorists themselves are largely to blame for this 
discrimination, for they have rather taken that same 
view of themselves. 

The modern automobile has brought about condi- 
tions similar to those that were the outcome of the 
period when the Englishman made the grand tour 
of Europe in his private coach and four, accompanied 
by a retinue of servants, maids, lackeys, mountains of 
luggage and his whole family. 

History has repeated itself with emphasis; the 
Anglo-Saxon still leads the van of luxurious travel, 
but it is the younger race from overseas, and it is the 
automobile in place of the lumbering coach that now 
swings up to the hotel and deposits its conglomerate 
load. All over Europe have sprung up hotels whose 
luxuriousness is a direct result of present-day touring 
conditions and are designed to match, the luxury that 
comes driving up to their doors, much of it by the 
automobile. 

What follows may apply for the most part to any 
of these methods, though certain it is the freedom that 
one has with their own car and chauffeur is something 
more considerable than if tied down to a schedule 
bargained for in a renting garage or the whims of a 
stranger chauffeur. At all events, in France, Ger- 
many, England even, or in Italy one is sure of getting 



466 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

fair treatment even in the latter case, if one arrives 
at a clear understanding in the first instance at any 
one of a half-dozen of the leading garages of cities 
like London, Paris, Berlin or Milan. In the prov- 
inces, too, one could doubtless do equally well, and 
for twenty to twenty-five dollars a day be practically 
the owner of an automobile for the period for which 
it is contracted, with no responsibilities except for 
the payment of the bills as rendered. You will have 
no question of repairs to consider, nor of the re- 
placing of tires, nor the cost of oil or gasolene, which 
latter becomes petrol in England, benzina in Italy, 
benzin in Germany and essence in France. Usually 
the chauffeur's keep is at the charge of the hirer, but 
this could probably be arranged for by a lump sum 
which allowed a dollar and a half a day therefor or 
a little more. 

Assuming that it is the European tour in general 
that is to be undertaken, it matters not so much as 
to whether the object of the tour be for luxurious 
enjoyment or pleasurable edification. The point is 
what one may get for the time and money expended. 
Actually one does get more in Europe than at home, 
and therein lies not the least of the charms of foreign 
travel by automobile. 

It is for the woman traveller that the luxuries 
of the automobile have been created. She can tour 
Europe as comfortably as she can sit in her own 
boudoir. There is the specially constructed tea- 
basket, with thermos bottles, if she wishes to have 
" five o'clock " en route, reading-lamps, telephones, 



THE WOMAN AND THE CAR 467 

racks for books and papers, every conceivable device 
for intricate baggage arrangements. 

It is possible in the present automobile trunks to 
stow away in perfect safety a good-sized wardrobe, 
such as is called for by the modern exigencies of 
fashionable travel. European travel is as much of 
a society event as Newport in summer or the Horse 
Show in winter, and the lady in the car needs a varied 
lot of garments (or she thinks she does) ; anyway, 
they are usually the chief accessories of the big tour- 
ing car. A trunk, a suitcase, a dressing-case bag, a 
large handbag ought to satisfy madame en route, but 
the question of hats is a burning one. " Where can 
I put my hat-box? " is woman's first question, and the 
chauffeur spends many anxious moments trying to 
adjust the relation of tires and hat-boxes. 

For really comfortable travel the car should not 
be overcrowded; two make the ideal touring party. 
Then if there is the maid, who, as a rule, sits beside 
the chauffeur, her luggage can be got down to a 
large suitcase, another being ample for the chauffeur's 
needs. 

Extra baggage and heavy trunks can be sent on 
ahead to the points where elaborate clothes will be 
needed, such as the large cities or the resorts, Aix- 
les-Bains, the Riviera, the German spas, and the 
Palace hotels of the fashionable watering-places. 
Thus will madame be prepared for the social round 
when she arrives on the scene. This method is pre- 
ferable to overloading the car with luggage, which 
always interferes with one's personal comfort. 



468 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

The thing that will worry the woman at the head of 
a retinue such as this will probably be as to how she 
shall carry her jewels. Indeed, this is a real problem ; 
also it may become a real danger. The automobile 
may attract the old-time brigand to go into business 
again if this keeps up. Still madame needs her jewels 
to match her Paris costumes, and the Palace hotels 
expect one to live up to their names. It is a bad 
thing to intrust the jewels to the care of the maid, 
who, as is the habit of maids, will be apt to lose her 
head and the jewel case at the same time in the many 
flittings to and from the car that are necessary in 
the course of the day. The responsibility of a lot of 
diamonds is enough to handicap any pleasure tour. 

A suggestion might be made. Have a small safe 
built in under the seat of your automobile for your 
jewel case and other valuables. This would certainly 
be better than leaving them to the uncertain handbag 
care of yourself or your maid. Naturally they 
should be taken into the hotel at night. It would be, 
however, the part of wisdom if the display of jewels 
were limited to only such articles as might be of 
actual use for the voyage. One of the principal 
objects of pleasure travel is to get rid of responsibility. 

One does not need a five-foot shelf for the guide- 
books to be used en tour, but the woman who inaugu- 
rates a convenient little book-case for the automobile 
will do a real service to the cause of travelling. There 
is, of course, the table, which can be let down not 
only for the tea-basket, but also for the more im- 
portant duty, on which to spread out the maps. One 




From the Point of View of the Cook 



THE WOMAN AND THE CAR 469 

always wants to follow the route oneself, or ought 
to, for this is one of the chief joys of motoring. 

If one is touring between the great resorts in the 
height of season it would be well to wire ahead for 
accommodations. If no maid or courier is along — and 
in truth there is no reason why there should be — the 
chauffeur — if he be a foreigner — could attend to this 
as well as arrange for the desired assortment of rooms 
on arrival. 

With regard to the foreign chauffeur let a word be 
said right here. His very acquaintance with the in- 
tricacies of foreign touring gives him the opportunity 
to add indirectly to his profits at the expense of his 
employers. He knows all the subtleties of the 
" commission " end of the European game, which 
but means that his employers pay for a number of 
things that they have no need of and at advanced 
rates. The American chauffeur, with his ignorance 
of the language and of conditions generally, will not 
be led into these temptations; he will not, in most 
cases, understand the hints thrown out to make money 
off of his employers; moreover, the strangeness of his 
position will lead him to siding with the owners of the 
car in a common cause in a foreign land, in preference 
to conspiring against them with the wily foreigner. 
If he can't act as courier he will at least be more 
faithful to his employer's interests. 

The automobile has made possible many combina- 
tions of tours abroad that the stage coach alone in 
a former day made accessible. The coming of the 
railway killed much of the romance of travel, but it 



470 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

has revived wonderfully under the regime of mechan- 
ical H. P. 

England is lovely as a touring ground from all 
points of view, but it soon palls on one after they 
have toured the west to Clovelly, south to Canterbury 
and Brighton, up the Thames Valley to Oxford and 
Warwick, and north or west — about, even so far as 
the Lake District or the Trossachs. 

After that, what? Nothing but the round over 
again. And the country inns? They have been de- 
lightful to look at in many cases, less delightful to 
sample in many more, and expensive every one, be- 
sides being exceedingly limited in what they have to 
offer. The leafy lanes of England are stagily pretty 
and road surfaces are almost invariably good in Eng- 
land and Scotland (less so in Ireland). It has been 
a pleasure indeed to roll over the modern Pilgrim's 
Way, the great North Road of coaching days and 
ways, the Bath Road of storied romance, or to climb 
Snowdon in Wild Wales, but after all, this hallowed 
ground is already so familiar that the automobile 
tourist, even woman, in England unconsciously pines 
for a larger horizon, a grander scale and more quaint, 
exotic surroundings than can be in Britain. 

Sooner or later things are bundled on board a cross- 
Channel packet — one is not even obliged to crate the 
automobile — and you fetch up in the delightful land 
of France, certainly the most practical touring ground 
for automobiles in all the world. 

You have been driving to the left in Britain, as is 
the English way, and now at last think you will 



THE WOMAN AND THE CAR 471 

get back to right-handedness. This is not so. As 
these lines are being written the powers that be, those 
who are responsible for the making and the upkeep 
of the good roads of France and the laws governing 
them, have come to the English way of thinking, and 
reversed the order of driving. 

In France a whole new set of conditions impose 
themselves upon the owner or the driver of an auto- 
mobile. But you do not have to pay a tax for having 
a device painted on the doors of your automobile, as 
you do in England, nor another tax for " employing 
a male servant " if you have a chauffeur along — 
as you must do in England — neither, as in England, 
do you have to pay an internal revenue tax for driving 
a car on the roads. You are free to do what you will 
in France for four months, and may even make what 
speed you like so long as you do not bowl over any- 
thing in your path, for the speed limit has just 
recently been abolished, too. This means something 
in the land of good roads par excellence. 

Supplies for the automobile are dearer in France 
than in England, but hotels are cheaper and better, 
the food most decidedly so. You are stuck less in 
this land of the " foreigner " than you are in Anglo- 
Saxondom, or indeed in any other part of Europe. 

From ten to twelve, or the utmost, fifteen francs 
a day you may be comfortably fed and lodged almost 
anywhere along the highways and byways of France, 
excepting, of course, in the resorts like Trouville, 
Aix-les-Bains, Nice, Cannes or Biarritz. The chauf- 
feur will be catered for at a considerably less figure, 



472 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

and you will have no charges for garage for the night 
in the majority of instances. 

Normandy and Brittany by automobile are a de- 
lightful fortnight's itinerary, and the hotels and roads 
are better in the former than in the latter. Along 
the valleys of the Seine and Marne and Loire (the 
latter comprising the "chateau country") are many 
surprises in the way of country inns and their attend- 
ant delights, to say nothing of historic and romantic 
sights and scenes which will give the woman in the 
car a new outlook on life from what she may have 
had before, even though she may have had some 
acquaintance with the same, arrived at by a more 
antiquated mode of travel. 

Again does fashion repeat itself. Just as in the 
old coaching days passengers and luggage were taken 
on in the courtyard of the inn, so does one often enter 
and leave the automobile in the courtyard of the 
country hotel, away from the fussy crowd that usually 
gathers and gapes around in the open street. Many 
a big and little country inn has its cobble-stoned in- 
terior court. It is almost the universal arrangement 
in France, in the old towns of Germany and indeed 
all over Europe, where the present-day hotels are 
direct descendants of the old posting houses. In 
England there are many inn courtyards still un- 
changed since the days when travel was by the over- 
balanced " mail-coach," which swerved perilously 
along over hill and dale and through narrow village 
streets, drawn by its four or six horses. 

Paris and its environs usually form a part of any 



THE WOMAN AND THE CAR 



473 



European automobile itinerary, but there is little 
pleasure to be derived until one is well free of the 



^WIGNON 

SZhcT 

OLT><PRQVJ5NCE 




awful roads which immediately surround most cities, 
and which with regard to Paris are no exception. 
Better to do Versailles, Saint Germain and Fontaine- 



474 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

bleau by train, unless one could take the former in 
on the way to the " chateau country," and the latter 
en route to Switzerland or the Riviera. 

Vichy and Aix-les-Bains may be included when 
bound for the Riviera, and it is about the only way 
they can be worked into any comprehensive tour of 
France. The Riviera, at almost any time between 
November and May, is the most delightful spot on 
earth. The automobile enhances its charms, though 
only as being a handy means of exploring the moun- 
tain hinterland of the maritime Alps, which is hardly 
known by the rank and fashion which spends its time 
tea-drinking and bridge-playing in the great palace 
hotels of this very worldly paradise. 

The region of the Pyrenees from the Bay of Biscay 
to the Mediterranean is another nearly perfect auto- 
mobile touring ground. It is comfortably warm in 
summer and not cold in winter. Seldom are the 
mountain roads snowed under, though it does rain 
for weeks at a time at certain periods^ when a dull 
sitting away of one's time at one or another of the 
tourist hotels of Pau, Luchon, Biarritz or Cambo im- 
poses itself upon the automobilist. Roads and hotels 
are of the very first rank, so altogether the region is 
likely to become more and more popular. 

Spain, as an automobiling ground, is not to be 
thought of, unless one is prepared for adventure, in- 
convenience and perhaps occasional hardship, though 
possibly no real danger. The customs officials, who 
take your deposit as you cross the frontier, may keep 
it, though legally they are bound to return it when 



THE WOMAN AND THE CAR 



475 



you take your car out of the country, but it may take 
months of diplomacy on the part of the Department 
of State and your Embassy at Madrid to get it back 
again. Unless it is real sport you are looking for, 
cut out Spain from 



your automobile itiner- 
ary, for the fording 
of streams without 
bridges, getting tan- 
gled up with long 
rows of mule trains 
and the mediocre ho- 
tels, require a high 
development of the 
sporting instinct. 

Switzerland for the 
automobilist is a sort 
of negative blessing. 
There are some good 
roads, and were it not 
for seemingly selfish 
interest on the part of certain local communities, 
tourists en automobile would be more welcome than 
they are. Certain of the mountain roads are closed 
to automobiles, and practically only the roads over 
the Passes of the Arlberg, the Saint Gothard and 
the Simplon are available to automobile traffic. One 
can enter at Basle or Geneva and get along to In- 
terlaken and Lucerne, but here and there will find a 
side road blocked to them, while those of the En- 
gadine are entirely closed. The anti-automobile 




476 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

attitude is daily becoming more and more pro- 
nounced in Switzerland. The Swiss — that nation of 
hotel keepers — fear that the automobile will take 
the tourist too rapidly through their little country, 
and they want, too, that visitors should make every 
use of their government-owned boats, railways and 
stage-coaches rather than adopt the new locomotion 
which can rush them through the little mountain 
republic in one day. 

Italy is the ideally romantic touring ground, or 
was with those of a former generation, but to-day 
the automobile owner or driver — particularly the 
woman in the car — will have a dozen conflicting 
opinions about it. Sometimes the opinion is good, 
as the result of a delightful day, and again, what with 
a hundred kilometres of bad road, an unsatisfactory 
meal by the way and a rather scraggy lodging for 
the night, one will pine for the good cheer of the 
country hotel of France and the good roads of that 
delightful land. Italy should be gone over pretty 
closely by road if one is to come away with an appre- 
ciation of its charms, for then, and then only, when 
the average of the good things you have run across 
has outdistanced those obviously unsatisfactory, will 
you think the thing worth while. The story is dif- 
ferently told by those who have debarked with their 
automobile at Naples and piked across to Switzer- 
land in three days of pleasant weather, but put in six 
weeks of touring north, east, south and west, as fancy 
wills, two-thirds of the time in a deluge, and quite 
another viewpoint will be opened up. When the gon- 



THE WOMAN AND THE CAR 477 

dolas, tied to quays at Venice, fill with water in a 
night and sink, one thinks there is too much dampness 
about to make automobiling enjoyable, even though 
their land gondola is safely quartered in the garage 
at Mestre, half a dozen miles away, as near as one 
may get to Venice by automobile. 

The region of the Italian lakes offers much of 
charm to the traveller by road, but the hotels that 
one patronises are not of the humble order, and there 
is little of the romantic simplicity that one usually 
associates with Italy. The kind is that which was 
conceived solely for the tourist, and from that point 
of view are satisfactory enough. The roads here are 
good, the best in Italy. 

Austria is doing much these days to attract the 
automobile tourist, and as the region of the Dolomites 
and the Austrian Tyrol is quite as lovely as the Swiss 
Alps, and the people far more friendly, the motor 
traffic from Italy, northward over the Austro-Italian 
mountain passes, is heavy and is increasing in volume 
with every season. 

Automobiling in the mountain region of Tyrol 
presents a combination of delights which is unusual. 
There are good roads, imposing mountain peaks on 
all sides, thrilling hair-pin turns on the roads over 
the passes and a primitiveness of countryside sights 
and scenes which is in strong contrast to the modernity 
with which one comes up at night in their hotel at 
Innsbruck and many other stopping places, which are 
frankly tourist resorts and nothing else, so far as 
catering to the stranger goes. 



478 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

Eastward to Vienna is a long pull, but worth it if 
one has the time; so is Dalmatia if one has the time, 
the money and the nerve. Here things are few and 
far between, but as much exotic as the Chinese walls; 
expensive, and fraught with considerable inconveni- 




IrvTbeValley 
TbeRhirve) 



ence and some danger now that the Near East is all 
but aflame with revolution. 

Germany in general, at least along the grand lines 
of communication, is good touring ground, and in 
the Black Forest region and down the Rhine one 
covers classic ground. 

The road by the Rhine runs on either side and in 
more ways than one partakes of those of France, 



THE WOMAN AND THE CAR 4 79 

though it is not for good roads that one comes this 
way; better one should be content with the glamour 
of romance which still hangs over the Teuton's be- 
loved river from Scaffhausen down through Bingen 
and Cologne to tidewater, where it mingles with the 
cold, green seas of the German Ocean. 

Holland and Belgium are hardly the most suitable 
automobile touring grounds in Europe, the former 
because, as one intrepid young American woman who 
drove her own car once said, you are liable to forget 
and run overboard on one edge of the country or the 
other. All the same the brick roads of Holland, 
running their many straight miles along the banks of 
canals or through polders gay with massed blossoms 
of tulips or hyacinths, make smooth going for the 
motor car. One does have to pull up every once 
and again to allow a sluggish canal barge to idle 
by whilst a bridge is being swung, but canals and 
bridges and barges, like the spotted cows, fat little 
Dutchmen and women and windmills and cheeses, are 
some of the things for which one comes to Holland, 
so why overwork your automobile in a rush to get 
away. 

Belgian roads are vile, at least those that are not 
good, and the former are in the majority. Here 
and there are some good stretches, main routes mostly, 
but the crossroads are something incomprehensibly 
bad, being paved with large, uneven blocks of stone 
which must have been laid centuries ago. There 
is considerable enjoyment to be got out of touring 
Belgium, even though the country is not large and 



480 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

the roads are as bad as they are. Particularly are 
some new sensations to be acquired in journeying up 
the valley of the Muse to Dinant, where perhaps 
you may even find a piece of the fine old dinanderie 
copperware, which will well repay you for the trouble 
of coming this way. 

The north African itinerary, from Algiers to Tunis, 
is the most exotic motor touring ground open to 
traffic to-day. Roads excellent, hotels of a passable 
kind — meaning, in this case, that if they are crude 
they are at least founded on the best of French tra- 
ditions. You will perhaps garage your automobile 
in a compound with a herd of camels, and once and 
again if you stray off into the desert you may sink 
hub deep in sand, but on the whole, the novelty of 
it will make up for any inconvenience, and no great 
hardships or thrilling adventures need be looked for. 

The sum of European road travels for the woman 
automobilist will be the realisation that it is a sport 
for women as well as man. Take your own automo- 
bile with your own driver, or another hired on advan- 
tageous terms, and one may have a vagabondage so 
greatly to the liking that it will be hard to stop. 
Don't scorch; leave that to the brief visit which the 
man may make to you. If he wants to be taken across 
Europe in a hurry, take him, and then turn in your 
tracks and do the same thing over again, or some- 
thing different, at a moderate speed, and you will 
think that you never had quite so enjoyable an out- 
ing in all your life. 





TOURING -CLUB <3<? 

FRANCE i-,- 

c3 \>/rs S%ic2 ifo toe Wr^ssvecer* 



STIMULATOR OF MODERN EUROPEAN TRAVEL 

BENEFITS THE AMERICAN 

GROWTH OF THE CLUB 

NATIONAL GOVERNMENT INSTITUTION 

WORK OF THE T. C. F. 

INFLUENCE OUTSIDE FRANCE 

ORGANIZATION OF THE T. C. F. 

BENEFITS TO THE WOMAN TRAVELLER 

SCHOOL FOR THE FRENCH HOTEL KEEPER 

CAMPAIGN OF HYGIENE 

" CHAMBRES HYGIENIQUES " 

T. C. F. THE TRAVELLER'S FRIEND 

ITS HELP TO THE AUTOMOBILIST 

GUIDE-ANNUAIRE 

THREE THOUSAND T. C. F. HOTELS 

ITS PARIS CLUBHOUSE 

TRANSFORMING FRENCH HOTELS 

SIGN OF THE GOOD HOTEL 

PRESERVATION OF LANDMARKS 

AID TO GOOD ROADS 

BUILDING A ROADWAY 

T. C. F. AND THE SMALL HOTEL 

THE WOMAN MEMBER 

TOURING INFORMATION 

GUIDE MAPS, ETC. 



XX 



THE TOURING CLUB DE FRANCE AND 
HOW IT AIDS THE TRAVELLER 

The famous Touring Club de France has been the 
great stimulator of modern travel in that happy land. 
Incidentally it has encouraged and braced up the 
languishing fortunes of the country innkeeper by a 
beneficent administration whose blessings have fallen 
upon the traveller and Boniface alike in a manner 
that gives each much to be thankful for. It was 
quick to see that the custom of travel by road of the 
days of the malle-poste and the post-chaise was return- 
ing with the advent of the bicycle and the automobile, 
and forthwith the innkeeper of the country town was 
encouraged to meet the conditions imposed by his 
new clientele in an adequate manner. 

The innkeeper himself might not have known how 
to read the signs of the times unless the formula was 
given him, but he embraced the opportunity that 
offered gladly, and to-day three thousand of him and 
his fellows scattered all over the country have a 
ready, new-made set of customers calling at their 
doors, and paying liberally, though not extravagantly, 
for the good cheer that is offered them. With the 
coming of his new fortunes there might have been 
danger that he would kill the goose that had just 

483 



484 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

begun to lay golden eggs again, but he was encour- 
aged to believe that his best advertisement would 
come from this new clientele, and up to now he has 
treated his members more fairly than the hoteliers 
of any other nation. 

The Touring Club de France is an association of 
public-spirited Frenchmen whose prime devotion is 
the development of le tourisme in their own delightful 
land, though by no means do their efforts stop there, 
for they seek to make plain sailing for their fellow- 
Frenchmen when they go beyond the frontiers and 
across the seas. In this connection it may be inter- 
esting to note that Americans, by a simple formula, 
may affiliate with this admirable organisation, with 
the result that they will have reason to bless the genius 
who instigated it for the real service that it will offer 
them, whether they be mere tourists or clwellers in 
the country. 

Originally the club was of most modest propor- 
tions, but, with the avowed object of making travel- 
ling easy and economical for its members, it has, in 
twenty years, grown like the proverbial snowball, 
from a meagre three thousand members at the end 
of its first year of existence, to a membership of 
nearly one hundred and fifty thousand. It has for 
its honorific head the President of the French Repub- 
lic, and has become a national government-recognised 
institution by decree, by which it is known as an 
Association for the Public Good. This means that 
it has all the backing and political influence which is, 
or ever will be, necessary in order to make known the 



TOURING CLUB DE FRANCE 485 

glories of France to travellers of all the world. The 
paternalism of the French Government is much to be 
appreciated as a noble motive, but actually the saga- 
cious French know that it will return its cost tenfold. 
France, outside of Paris, the " chateau country " and 
the Riviera resorts, has not been "toured" to the 
limit as have Switzerland and Italy, though the utter- 
most corners are fast becoming known to genuine 
vagabond travellers, until to-day one is as likely to 
see at Saint Jean Pied du Port, in the heart of the 
Basque country, Americans singly or in couples, as 
they are to find them footing it over the Tuscan hills. 

The paternal interest of the Government in en- 
couraging the development of the T. C. F. is not a 
phase of communism, but a sort of national backing- 
up of the projects of a nation-wide institution, even 
though it was born in the brain of an individual. 

The club owns to a virtual government organisa- 
tion in miniature, with a Cabinet of Executives, who 
set the machinery of various departments in motion 
and launch from time to time projects tending to 
ameliorate touring conditions in France, going so far 
even at times as to enter the field of politics and do 
a little lobbying in legislative halls. There has never 
been a suspicion of graft attached to its methods, and 
this is in its favour, too. The club was one of the 
prime movers in establishing that French classical 
school for hotel keepers which is intended to forestall 
the rising wave of German-Swiss methods, which are 
fast engulfing the hotels of many of the resorts even 
in France. This it combats also in another way, 



486 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

handing out freely much practical advice and assist- 
ance intended to better conditions for the country 
hotel keeper, and add to the satisfaction and comfort 
of the traveller who lodges beneath his roof. 

It suggests and aids in the betterment and upkeep 
of roads, going so far in some instances as to actually 
designate a prolongation of a mountain road which 
would add considerably to the prosperity of the 
region, but which has hitherto been neglected, owing 
to less needed but more insistent demands elsewhere. 
The preservation of historic sights and monuments 
has been not the least commendable of its works, and 
solely by its own initiative the club has caused to be 
developed that famous National Park of the Esterels, 
bounded by a forty kilometre strip of ocean side 
roadway on the Riviera, known as the Corniche d'Or, 
a shelf-like, cornice-built roadway, overlooking the 
blue waters of the Mediterranean between Saint 
Raphael and Cannes in southern France. This road- 
way is the paradise of automobilists in the region of 
the world's most famous winter playground. 

The club has recently published the detailed plans 
of a mountain chalet, a hotel of modest proportions, 
which may be readily erected in any undeveloped 
Alpine beauty spot. It is hoped that the ultimate 
adoption of the scheme will some day result in the 
Alps of Dauphiny and Savoy rivalling Switzerland 
in the facilities and accommodations offered the tour- 
ist. Three prime features impose themselves upon 
such a scheme; that these modern mountain rest- 
houses shall be frequent, reasonable in price and ex- 



TOURING CLUB DE FRANCE 487 

cellent in what they have to offer, if not luxurious. 
To this end the club has often gone to the trouble 
to find capital for some enterprise which hitherto 
lacked funds for exploitation. 

It is readily seen from this that the labours of this 
formidable organisation are not for the benefit of one 
class of individuals alone, but for all, not for the 
innkeepers of one region, nor for travellers of French 
nationality alone, but for the benefit of all France 
and for the traveller from the utmost corners of the 
world when he crosses the land by rail or road or 
aeroplane. The ramifications of the influence of the 
club go to the farthermost French colonies and, if 
you are a member therof, you will reap the benefits 
as greatly in Cambodia as in Touraine; furthermore, 
its affiliated hotels and delegates are found in all the 
chief centres of Continental Europe, even at Cairo 
and in Constantinople. 

The various club committees are so numerous and 
potent that they are doing the work which in many 
other lands is being done, or ought to be done, by 
Governmental Departments devoted to the same end. 
The spirit is national through and through. There 
is never a question of local interest arising in France 
but that the T. C. F. will voluntarily lend its aid 
in furthering that solidarity of patriotism and the 
love of " la belle France " which shall assure its 
ultimate success. 

The woman traveller benefits as largely as any 
other class from the good work that the Touring 
Club de France has done with respect to putting the 



488 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

country hotels on a plane where they are wholly to 
be appreciated. Their best aspect has ever been that 
their fare was admirable as to quality, excellently 
cooked and the price therefor most reasonable; when 
it came to the accommodations offered the wayfarer, 
the lone woman traveller often had misgivings as to 
the propriety of lodging beneath its roof. This was 
born of misunderstanding, which was in part justi- 
fiable, though actually the question of propriety with 
respect to a French country hotel ought never to have 
been raised. A certain disorderliness, not to say 
shabbiness, was often apparent, and this worked to 
the detriment of many a really excellently endowed 
small hotel. The T. C. F., seizing upon this, sought 
to bring the various attributes of the century-old hotel 
of compromising countenance up to the level of the 
product so temptingly prepared in the great hooded 
fireplace of its kitchen. The problem was solved in 
the twinkling of an eye, and very few small hotels 
of France to-day on the beaten track, and not many 
off, will offend the most exacting of travellers, who 
will make due allowance for the fact that things 
are not as they are at home, nor can they be expected 
to be. 

One department of the club studies the question of 
the hygienic fitting up and installation of the country 
hotel. In this respect it had practically virgin soil 
to work on in France, for the deficiencies of the small 
country hotel were a marvel of disgust to the much 
travelled person of a generation or so ago. The 
club has invented, or at least developed, the " ckambre 



TOURING CLUB DE FRANCE 489 

hygienique" a sleeping apartment furnished on the 
most modern of sanitary lines as contrasted with what 
it was before. Gone is the old-fashioned coffin-like 
bed, heavy-draped windows and mantelpieces which 
were depressing even in design, and doubly so when 
faded, old and dirty — and they were impossible to 
keep clean. There was perhaps not filthiness, but 
there was a disorderly aspect that amounted to about 
the same thing as far as its effect upon one was 
concerned. 

The hotel correspondence bureau of the club turns 
out twenty thousand letters a year in response to 
inquiries, and also prints an enamelled tin sign which 
it presents gratis to any hotelier who may ask for it, 
admonishing the users of the toilet rooms to leave 
them " aussi propre " as they may have found them. 
This may seem ridiculous to the American at home, 
but not so to he or she who has travelled in 
France. 

The T. C. F. sign hanging before the doors of 
more than three thousand affiliated French hotels is 
an eloquent argument of the principles laid down by 
the club. 

To pass to the sentimental side, no historic spot 
is desecrated by vandal picknickers, no celebrated 
shrine of history or art is torn down or turned into a 
rag-shop or a bar-room, nor are the great trees of 
some classic wildwood, where roam the stag and boar 
yet, as they did in the reigns of Henri IV and Francois 
Premier, pillaged to make firewood or cottage fur- 
niture, but that the T. C. F. protests and puts a stop 



49Q THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

thereto. The extent to which the club may yet go 
with regard to proposing, or solving, burning ques- 
tions which seem to concern the various departments 
of the national government little or not at all, can 
hardly be foreseen if its powers gain strength in the 
next decade as rapidly as they have in the past, and 
the membership reaches the quarter of a million mark, 
as is likely. 

The Touring Club de France offers its members 
for a dollar a year the privilege of patronising its 
three thousand affiliated hotels at a special " prix 
de faveur," a certain discount varying from five 
to fifteen per cent being allowed members in 
good standing. It secures also certain reductions 
for its members on trains and boats, eliminates 
Custom House difficulties and dues when crossing the 
frontiers, and by the celebrated "tryptich" — which 
it invented — passes the automobilist across first one 
European frontier and then another, after his once 
having deposited the " guarantee " with the club 
that he will ultimately bring his machine back 
again. 

The club publishes a series of beautifully designed 
and printed road maps, perhaps the finest works of 
their kind ever produced, and supplies, at a substan- 
tial discount, any and all maps, plans and guides 
wherever published. 

Its Guide-Annuaire, or hotel directory, is a most 
useful book for the traveller in France. It is worth 
all the Baedekers, Joannes and Murrays rolled into 
one so far as the quality and quantity of information 







A Country Hotel of France 



TOURING CLUB DE FRANCE 491 

as to French hotels is concerned. It gives prices in 
detail of all the affiliated hotels, a little zig-zag imi- 
tation of a ray of lightning signifies that there is 
electricity, a little black rectangle that there is a dark 
room for the photographer, a monkey-wrench that 
there is a pit and a work-shop and garage at the dis- 
position of the autoist, and a crossed knife and fork 
that the hotel is noted for the excellence of the table, 
with a similar distinguishing mark denoting good 
beds. 

It notes further where certain specialties among 
the good things of the table for which France is 
noted are to be had. One may, by the aid of this 
excellent guide, before starting out, make up a sort 
of gastronomic tour of France. One goes to Rouen 
for duck and peas, to Dieppe for fried sole, to 
Toulon for mussels, to Concarneau for fried fresh 
sardines, Bayonne for its famous hams, Marseilles for 
bouillabaisse, Toulouse for capons, Pithiviers for lark 
pies and Perigueux for truffles, and so on. It is 
another reason for being for the little tour in France 
which was made popular by Henry James a quarter 
of a century ago, and is in no way of losing its popu- 
larity. 

Besides all this the club, by the means of its 
magnificent library and its staff of librarians at its 
imposing club house on the Avenue de la Grande 
Armee at Paris, can give one world-wide travel in- 
formation, or may consult yourself its exceedingly 
complete collection of road maps and guides in a 
manner far more comfortable than in any other 



492 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

library in the world, more comfortably even than in 
the British Museum in London or at the Bibliotheque 
Nationale in Paris. 

A few years since the gossiping world of Paris was 
in an uproar over the notorious " Humbert affair," 
wherein one known as " La Grande Therese," got 
inextricably mixed up with a certain number of 
mythical millions, and became so involved that her 
magnificent town house, her hotel prive in the Avenue 
de la Grande Armee, was forced upon the market 
by an unfeeling decree of the court, and actually 
went begging for a purchaser. This was perhaps 
caused by the fact that the decree went into operation 
during the silly season of August, when everybody 
but three and three-quarter millions of the population 
were out of town. A few of the club officials hap- 
pened to be enjoying Paris in summer, and as at a 
meeting held just previously it had been decided to 
look for a new location, as a change from its crowded 
quarters in a couple of tiny rooms over a cafe in the 
Place de la Bourse, they bethought themselves of 
acquiring this pretentious but very elegantly appointed 
Paris mansion. 

It was rather a large and soiled parcel of linen 
that the court set about to bundle up, and thus, with 
a little ready cash to spare, the club was able to buy 
in the property for a mere nothing. Actually, the 
creditors of the Humberts got very little little, but 
the court fees and the lawyers were paid, and the 
Touring Club de France, with membership at a dol- 
lar a year, came to be housed more luxuriously than 



TOURING CLUB DE FRANCE 493 

many a club that has difficulty in collecting its hun- 
dred-dollar-a-year dues from delinquent members. 

To-day where once the pseudo-fashionable crowd 
of Humbert hangers-on once stalked through marble 
halls, the plebeian members of the T. C. F. assemble 
and call their own town house. You may be a mere 
globe-trotter, a bicyclist, an automobilist or a yachts- 
man, but all the same, once elected a member, you 
may get here for five francs a year, or six if you are 
a foreigner, what you may not get elsewhere on earth. 

France is the land of good cooks, and we know it 
and love it for that, if not for other things as well, 
and to this end the Touring Club de France is making 
it more attractive than ever with the precepts which 
it is distributing broadcast to the innkeeper. It was 
not enough to counsel him to keep up the traditions 
of the table. The doctrine of cleanliness and airi- 
ness is being preached on all sides, and reasonableness 
in price ; above all, not to exploit the stranger because 
he is a stranger and may not come that way again. 

With all his ability at turning out a meal of ex- 
cellence the French country chef often did it formerly 
under most disagreeable, uncomfortable and incon- 
venient conditions. Now all is changed in the French 
countryside, and in many of the large towns as well, 
where deficiencies were often quite as much to be 
remarked. 

The good work of the club has made itself felt in 
many quarters, and often in the tiniest of towns one 
or more innkeepers vie with one another as being 
privileged to hang out the sign of the T. C. F. before 



494 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

their portes-cocheres. This has made competing es- 
tablishments brace up, too, and now the ill-kept, 
dingy and unappealing inn frequently met with in 
the French town as late as a decade ago is a thing 
of the past on the beaten track, and mostly is this true 
farther afield as well. 

The hygienic sleeping-rooms (the chambres hygien- 
iques popularised by the T. C. F.) were needed badly 
all over France, both in the cities and towns alike, 
where only too often a bedroom was but a mere cup- 
board opening on some dingy, unsanitary courtyard. 
Now, where the club's admonitions have been fol- 
lowed, all is white lacquer on the walls, scrim curtains 
at the windows, with iron or brass beds replacing the 
upholstered abominations of other days. The house- 
wife will appreciate all this, and those who have 
studied the necessity of well-living as an adjunct to 
well-being will appreciate the fact that the club has 
printed for free distribution a series of specific rules 
for hotel keepers who can be induced to remodel their 
establishments as to the volume of cubic contents of 
each sleeping-room as well as the area and position 
of the windows, the height to ceiling, nature of wall 
decorations, floor coverings and even the size of the 
wash-basins. Frequently an old hotel has built on 
an addition conforming to these requirements, or, as 
far as possible, remodelled its old form. 

Trade follows the flag as well in the hotel business 
as in the affairs of the nation, and let a good country 
inn be found midway between Macon and Dijon in 
the famous Burgundy wine district, and the touring 



TOURING CLUB DE FRANCE 495 

automobilist bound for Switzerland or Rivierawards 
will stop there for his dejeuner instead of pushing 
on to the next large town, which he often wrongly 
assumes as able to supply something more to his 
liking than can be found in a place lettered less large 
on the maps. 

The hotel industry all over France is, by the 
earnestness of the efforts of the Touring Club de 
France, conforming to the new order of things, and 
prosperity which had languished for generations is 
now coming to many a quaint old posting inn of 
some market town in the Cote d'Or or by the banks 
of the Rhone, which since the advent of the railway 
and the days of Monte Cristo had fallen into 
desuetude. 

Sometimes, where the thing was needed badly, the 
Touring Club has gone ahead at its own expense and 
established up-to-date sanitary fittings in some likely 
hotel in a much-travelled region, as in some little 
town in the " chateau country " of the Loire, with the 
result that the knowledge of the existence of these 
things in their midst has given other innkeepers an 
inducement to brace up for fear that business would 
pass them by if they, too, did not meet the new con- 
ditions and demands of twentieth-century travel. 
The bathroom is still chiefly wanting in French hotels, 
excepting those of the cities, the big towns and the 
resorts. Beyond these it is still considered as a sort 
of super-luxury, and when found, wherever found in 
France, in fact, one pays the price, almost the level 
of American prices. There is nothing cheap about 



496 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

a bath in France. Perhaps it is for this that one 
still sees an occasional Englishman crossing Paris 
from the Gare de Nord to the Gare de Lyon, with 
his tin dish bath-tub strapped tightly down with his 
trunks on top of his taxi-auto. This is not exagger- 
ated fancy; one may see the same ludicrous sight 
almost any day. 

The force of example was never better exemplified 
than in the transformation of a certain aspect of 
the French hotel industry as brought about by the 
T. C. F. Its sign before the door of a hotel means 
to the traveller, even though he be a stranger in a 
strange land, good beds, good cooking, cleanliness, 
reasonable prices and generous treatment. And all 
this without the loss of the picturesque element of 
local character, which is what many of us travel for. 
The ancient posting inn has been cleaned up, re- 
painted and remodelled a bit, but its artistic out- 
lines are still there, and the stable yard and the stables, 
if peopled less romantically by automobiles of steel 
and brass and aluminum than in the days of the coach 
and four and the berlin-de-voyage in which our 
grandfathers travelled, serves its purpose quite as 
well as of old. 

This came but slowly, but the ultimate transforma- 
tion, or at least modernising, of the old houses which 
bore such names as the " Ecu d'Or," " Grand Mo- 
narque," or " Belle Etoile," which abounded in the 
good old monarchial days of the empire, has banished 
stuffed chairs and sofas of horse-hair or mangy red 
plush or green rep, as well as the moth-eaten bear or 



TOURING CLUB DE FRANCE 497 

wolf skins which served for descents de lit, for some- 
thing more hygienic and more cleanly and pleasing 
to gaze upon. As before mentioned, the wash-basins 
even have been given a thought. A certain size 
sufficiently ample to be useful has been ordained to 
replace the diminutive chocolate service which once 
did duty, but which can no longer serve to clean off 
the dirt and grime of travel by the new locomotion. 

Carpets on the floors and fuzzy wall-papers have 
been banished, and heavy window lambrequins, 
through which only filtered a dim religious light not 
strong enough to show the microbes to a former 
generation, who, to tell the truth, thought little 
enough about such things. To-day we are more en- 
lightened, but in France the educating process is still 
in its busiest stage, and the Touring Club de France 
is in the thick of the fight. 

The three thousand Touring Club signs are posted 
before the doors of as many hotels all over France, 
from Douarnenez in Finistere — where the sardines 
come from — to Biarritz, the playground of princes, 
and Nice and Cannes and Monte Carlo on the Rivi- 
era. One and all of these signs stand for the plat- 
form upon which the T. C. F. is founded. Let one 
of these hotels so much as take the slightest undue 
advantage of a member of the T. C. F. in good 
standing, and the full force of the influence of a 
quarter-century old organisation, a hundred and fifty 
thousand members strong, falls upon him, with the 
ultimate result that perhaps the sign which has drawn 
to him the bulk of his business is taken away and 



498 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

rehung on the porte-cochere of his competitor across 
the way. 

Occasionally in travelling about France one sees 
in some famous viewpoint, where a widespread pano- 
rama of sea and sky unfolds, a great massive oaken 
and iron bench with the initials T. C. F. graven 
deep therein, and a further intimation that it 
is delivered to the care of the public. This 
is another of the public-spirited innovations of the 
club, and on a more elaborate scale are the Tables 
d' Orientation, great circular tables of porcelain, or 
enamel ware, whereon the striking topographical char- 
acteristics of the horizon are graven. They are an 
admirable aid to the tourist, and much appreciated, 
as for instance, the one on Mont Boron at Nice, on 
the Riviera, which in one direction points out that 
Corsica may be seen, on the other the Maritime 
Alps, etc. Another of these wonderfully interesting 
aerial signboards, as they may be called, has recently 
been placed on the terrace of Henri Quatre's natal 
chateau at Pau, overlooking the colline of Juranqon, 
from whose vineyards came that famous wine which 
the infant Prince of Beam was made to drink within 
twenty-four hours of his birth. There is another 
on the height of Bon Secours, near Rouen. In all, 
there are some fifty of these plaques scattered about 
France. 

The greatest monument of all to the initiative and 
powers of the Touring Club de France is, however, 
the magnificent Corniche d'Or of the Esterels, a forty 
kilometre stretch of superb roadway on the French 



TOURING CLUB DE FRANCE 499 

Riviera following the contours of the coast line, up 
hill and down dale from Frejus to Cannes, through 
Saint Raphael, a municipality which has done the club 
the honour of naming its principal thoroughfare the 
Boulevard du Touring Club. At least two great and 
prosperous hotels, non-existent a decade ago, owe 
their establishment, and the trade which keeps them 
going, to this new-born idea of making a new entrance 
by road to the beauties of the Riviera. 

Each month the club issues, gratis to members, a 
monthly illustrated magazine giving information as 
to hotels, innovations of travel of interest to its mem- 
bers, sketch maps, illustrated itineraries and what not. 

It has recently instituted a competition for hotel 
keepers who are conducting an establishment for tour- 
ists at an all-in price not to exceed nine francs a day, 
about one dollar and eighty cents. This should 
sound good to the traveller who has already been 
plucked at some popular super-luxurious resort and 
bring home again more forcibly than ever that the 
best of the good things of this world are not to be 
found in the footsteps of the throng. 

With such inducements the hotel industry in 
France, so far as many of the establishments of the 
small towns are concerned, is on the qui vive as it 
never has been before. 

The nautical section of the club, recently founded, 
has undertaken to build landing stages for automobile 
boats along the Seine and some other of the French 
rivers, and has appointed, here and there, waterside 
hotels as headquarters, with the result that motor- 



5oo THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

boat touring in France is a growing pastime, an ideal 
way of travelling, by the way, reasonable in price 
(even to the acquiring of the motor-boat), with ever 
the assurance of finding a Touring Club hotel at 
convenient distances on the chiefly travelled French 
waterways. Thus another source of revenue for the 
hotel keeper has been tapped. He could not have 
done it alone, but the club, as much for his benefit 
as that of its lay members, has encouraged the thing, 
and thus it was born. 

Who can now say that the French know not how 
to travel? When indeed will Anglo-Saxons know 
so well how to play the game of the comfortable 
non-conventional method of travel, the kind that does 
not mean blowing yourself at the first hostelry that 
you come to, the kind that means that the traveller 
and the innkeeper who caters for him are bound 
together by a common lien, the one not to expect 
too much and the other to make the way easy and 
the price reasonable for what he has to offer the 
traveller on his way. 

Abroad, on the Continent, the American and Eng- 
lish traveller usually rushes about madly and demands 
bath- and sitting- and smoking-rooms in most unlikely 
places, whereas our Gallic brothers and sisters take 
things easy, pay a great deal more care to the kind of 
food that is served and how, and above all, how it is 
cooked, and thus gets the maximum of pleasure and 
satisfaction as a result. 

The participation of the woman traveller in the 
benefits to accrue from association with this admir- 



TOURING CLUB DE FRANCE 501 

ably conducted, indeed wellnigh omnipotent, Tour- 
ing Club de France, and contact, as occasion presents 
itself, with the exceedingly affable corps of librarians 
and officials, will give her a better source for the 
procuring of reliable information about many of the 
things that matter to the woman abroad than all the 
renting agencies and ticket offices that were ever con- 
ceived to befuddle the person of modest desires and 
means. 

In its contact with the stranger the part played by 
the T. C. F. is, first of all, to be as well-informed as 
possible on the ways and means of getting about 
France. For a stranger in a strange land there is no 
other source of supply at all to be compared to this. 
Bureaus of one kind or another there are in Ger- 
many, but as they are charged chiefly with local in- 
terests they can never hope to fill as plentiful a role 
as that played by the Touring Club de France, which, 
recognising that France is at once the best and the 
least known of all foreign lands to the English- 
speaking peoples, seeks to make its delights better 
known. 




'oreigners^ 



LEASING AN APARTMENT 
BOARDING-HOUSES AND PENSIONS 

tradespeople's ACCOUNTS 

BANKS AND BANKING 

PAYMENT BY CHEQUE 

MARRIED WOMAN'S BANK ACCOUNT 

IMPORTANT PARIS CONCIERGE 

DEBTS OF THE FOREIGNER 

PAYMENTS ON ACCOUNT 

DRESSMAKERS' CLAIMS 

FOREIGNER IN FRANCE " 

FORWARDING MAIL 

RESPONSIBILITY OF HOTELS 

HOTELS AND GUESTS' EFFECTS 

HOUSEHOLD EFFECTS OF THE STRANGER 

LAW OF LIMITATION 

WEIGHTS AND MEASURES 

MARRIAGE AND MONEY 

TITLES OF NOBILITY 

PROPERTY OF FOREIGNERS 

TELEGRAMS AND TIPS 



XXI 
FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 

ANIMALS PROTECTION OF 

In Paris a Societe Protectrice des Animaux concerns 
itself with the prevention of cruelty to animals. No- 
tice should be given to any agent or policeman. 

APARTMENTS 

The question of sewage should be especially in- 
vestigated on taking a house or apartment, for very 
many of the modern houses are not connected with 
the main sewage system. They should have a direct 
connection ("tout a I' e gout") for one to feel sure 
that a very important series of prospective troubles 
are thus to be avoided. 

Water taxes, or rates, are usually paid by the 
owner of the building, though by a common under- 
standing they may be included in the monthly rent 
bill. 

A lease of an apartment may be verbal or written ; 
in the former case the receipt for rent paid (quit- 
tance) should explain the conditions. A lease 
(bail) should be registered by the lessee, at his ex- 
pense, unless otherwise provided for. In general, 
rent is paid once a quarter and in advance. Certain 

505 



506 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

repairs (reparations locatives) are at the charge of 
the lessee, but not, for instance, window panes broken 
by wind or hail, or anything that gives way purely 
from old age. The difficulty is to prove all these 
things; the landlord usually has his own ideas. It 
would be well to have all these set out in the lease, 
if possible. The lessee usually agrees to care for the 
premises as a " bon pere du famille." Sub-leasing, 
unless forbidden in the original lease, is a common 
practice. 

APARTMENT KEYS 

The keys are by custom given up to the concierge 
when the lessee leaves, and if lessee is absent for any 
length of time, after notice of quitting is given (by 
registered letter usually to the proprietor or his 
agent), the keys should be left with the concierge, 
that the apartment may thus be shown to a prospec- 
tive lessee. Whatever inconvenience this may sup- 
posedly incur must be borne, and may be considered 
obligatory, as it is usually provided for in the lease or 
bail. 

DOGS IN APARTMENTS 

Do not keep a barking dog, which may annoy 
your neighbours, in your apartment; don't keep a 
dog anyway in Paris. A flat dweller in 1910 was 
fined fifty francs for keeping a dog in his apartment 
which barked at night and annoyed others living 
under the same roof. Three separate convictions en- 
sued, and the dog was finally got rid of as being too 
expensive a luxury. 



FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 507 

AUTOMOBILE REGISTRATION 

The conductor of an automobile must have a cer- 
tificate of competency, and the automobile be regis- 
tered with the civil authorities, besides being " de- 
clared " at the Mairie, or town hall, in the place 
where one is domiciled. Various taxes are imposed, 
and even the foreign-made automobile of a foreign 
tourist is subject to these taxes, after four months 
sojourn in France. 

BROKEN WINDOWS 

If the window of your apartment is broken by a 
stone thrower, by a careless passerby — one assumes a 
small boy — the proprietor is bound to replace it, not 
yourself, as locataire. If it is broken by stones 
thrown during a riot, it is a case of force majeur, 
and the locataire pays — this is according to article 
1755 of the Civil Code. 

BICYCLES 

Bicycles must be fitted with a plaque de controle 
(a new one each year), or badge, which may be had 
at any tobacconist's at a cost of three francs. Those 
only are exempt who remain less than three months 
in France. 

BOARDING HOUSES AND PENSIONS 

One may not conduct a boarding house or pension 
in Paris without a permit from the Service des Garnis 
of the Prefecture of Police. Identity as to national- 
ity, personal and family details and an explicit de- 
scription of the dwelling or apartment to be so used 
must be furnished by personal application and inter- 
view. A list of boarders must be kept in formal 



508 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

written-up order for inspection by the police at stated 
intervals, or indeed upon any occasion demanded. 

BIRTH CERTIFICATES 

A birth certificate (acte de naissance) should be 
procured at the nearest Mairie, or town hall, of all 
children born in France, and this upon declaration 
within three days of the event. In case of children 
of American parents, they should be registered forth- 
with at nearest American consulate. 

BOOKS AND BOOKKEEPING 

A tradesman is obliged to keep a daily journal, 
a letter-book and stock-book. All of these must be 
signed or initialed by the proper authorities once a 
year, who take notice that no pages have been re- 
moved or others substituted, and that no manifestly 
fraudulent additions or omissions are to be noted. 
These books of account are obliged to be preserved 
for ten years, and a client may force a tradesman to 
show his books in case of dispute. Another regula- 
tion which affects the tradesman is that he must pub- 
lish publicly his marriage contract before starting in 
business, that furnishers may know just how far he 
may be responsible financially, for often a man will 
have passed over certain rights in this world's goods 
for the sole benefit of his wife and prospective chil- 
dren ; such a procedure will also show to what extent 
his wife's fortune, if any, is available for use in her 
husband's business. 

BANKS AND BANK CHEQUES 

Banks and banking, as the words are known in 
the United States, are hardly of the same significance 



FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 509 

in France, save as one may patronise one of the 
avowed American institutions located in Paris. Pay- 
ment by cheque in France is not at all the common 
procedure that it is in America or England. A 
French cheque is dated by writing the date and month 
in letters, not in figures; each bears a ten centime 
stamp, and the same may not afterwards serve as 
proof of the payment of an account, save through the 
courtesy of the bank officials, for cancelled cheques are 
not returned to the drawer. A cheque must be signed 
the same day that it is drawn, and must be payable 
on sight — a vue. It may be payable to bearer 
(porteur) or to order (ordre), and the entire text 
of the cheque must be in the handwriting of the 
drawer. The holder of a cheque must present it 
within five days, if payable at the place at which it is 
dated, or eight days, if payable at another place, 
otherwise payment may be refused by the bank upon 
instructions of the drawer, and the holder loses even 
the right to claim its sum against the drawer if there 
are no funds in the bank with which to pay it after 
this delay. 

The responsibility of payment on a cheque being 
made to the right person devolves entirely upon the 
drawer; the bank assumes no responsibility. 

A Letter of Credit, or any of the various forms 
of Travellers' Cheques issued by responsible concerns, 
like the American Express Company, the Hamburg- 
American Line, etc., are useful for travellers, but 
a deposit subject to cheque in the Credit Lyonnaise, 
the Comptoir National d'Escompte or the Societe 



5io THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

General at Paris, is the most convenient method of 
having funds at one's ready call if settled down in 
France. 

A married woman may not have a current bank 
account, except with the written consent of her hus- 
band. 

" CITIZENSHIP " AS RELATED TO " DOMICILE " 

In any dealings with French officials, or United 
States diplomatic or consular officers in France, or 
indeed anywhere abroad, do not confuse the questions 
of citizenship (nationality) and domicile and resi- 
dence. The confusion of these points may be fraught 
with great importance in any legal discussion which 
may come up. 

CITIZENSHIP IN FRANCE 

French citizenship belongs by right to legitimate 
children born abroad of a French father; children 
born in France of unknown parents or of a French 
mother whose father is unknown; children born in 
France of a foreign father who has neglected to es- 
tablish his legal status as a foreigner — in the case of 
Americans by registration at an American Consulate 
between their eighteenth and nineteenth birthdays. 

Citizenship may be acquired in France by a foreign 
woman when she marries a Frenchman, by children 
of a foreigner resident in France by election and by 
naturalisation. 

Frenchmen may lose their French citizenship by 
naturalisation under a foreign power; a Frenchwoman 
who marries a foreigner by becoming a widow, or a 



FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 511 

divorcee may recover French citizenship under certain 
conditions. 

CITIZENSHIP AND REGISTRATION OF AMERICANS 
AT CONSULATE 

Americans living abroad should register at the 
nearest American Consulate in order to preserve their 
citizenship. 

Children born abroad of American parents should 
be registered at the American Consulate before their 
nineteenth year. 

CHILD LABOUR 

Child labour in France is controlled by law. They 
are forbidden to work between 9 P. M. and 5 A. M. 

CONCIERGES 

The concierge of a Paris dwelling is a very im- 
portant person. His duties and responsibilities are 
many. Foreign residents should make friends with 
their concierge, otherwise he may be very disagree- 
able indeed. He receives one's letters, parcels and 
telegrams, and delivers them at your door three times 
a day, takes note of the names of callers and must 
tell them if you are " in " or " out." At any hour 
of the day or night he must respond to a call at the 
door or grande porte, must forward letters, etc., if 
one is away temporarily, and for one year after one 
has vacated an apartment. He must keep the stair- 
ways, halls and dooryards in a state of cleanliness, 
etc., etc. He is the agent of the landlord, in many 
cases, for the collection of rents, and expects a sum 
equal to two per cent of the yearly rental as a New 



512 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

Year's gift from the tenant. Curiously enough there 
is a custom, usage, or right — but it is apparently a 
dead letter — whereby the concierge may appropriate 
one faggot every time a tenant gets in a supply of 
wood. The concierge, when he rents you an apart- 
ment, demands a denier a dien, or payment on ac- 
count, of his future pourboires, often a trifling sum; 
a domestic servant is also entitled to the same thing 
upon engagement. 

If the concierge of your apartment deliberately 
annoys you — as taking advantage of the particular 
occasion when you are about to give a reception to 
paint the handrail of the staircase, you may sue his 
employer for damages, and, if your case is well- 
founded, win it. This, provided you want to take 
the trouble. If your concierge is really so disagree- 
able as all that you had better move. He will not 
of course try the same trick again, but might con- 
ceivably try one something similar. 

If the concierge of your Paris apartment house 
(and this is local custom rather than law) goes off 
and leaves a small child of six or eight in charge, and 
a burglar breaks in and steals, his employer — the 
proprietor of the building — is responsible. French 
law recognises equality of sex, and a man or woman 
may be concierge, but they " must be capable of 
carrying out the duties so entrusted to them." 

DEBTS 

Debts due from foreigners can be collected by 
restraint upon the effects of the foreigner who may 
be temporarily resident in a French hotel, house or 



FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 513 

apartment. It is called a Saisie Foraine, and can 
only be put into execution by the creditor after appli- 
cation to the Judge of the Tribunal du Premier In- 
stance, or a Justice of the Peace of the District 
where the goods of the debtor are to be found. 

DEATHS 

Deaths after being declared at the Mairie, or 
town hall, and a " certificat de Deces " issued, may 
be followed by an immediate funeral, usually 
arranged direct with the Bureau des Pompes Funebres 
at a fixed tariff, according to the elaborateness of the 
cortege, etc., such charges being regulated by law, 
and ranging from forty francs upward. 

DEPOSITS OR PAYMENTS ON ACCOUNT 

Arrhes is an unusual word which you may meet 
with in your dealings with your milliner or dress- 
maker. A cabman even may demand his arrhes in 
case he is taken for a long journey across town, or 
under circumstances by which he has no assurance 
of being paid his fare. Sometimes arrhes are asked 
for in taking a lease of a house, apartment or studio. 
In these cases the payment and acceptance of arrhes 
binds both parties, though the lease or bail may not 
have been signed. 

DISGUISES 

One is not allowed to wear publicly costumes of 
another sex, nor any uniform, medal or decoration 
without being entitled thereto, exceptions being made 
in the first case at the seasons of Mardi Gras and Mi 
Careme. 



5H THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

DOCTORS AND DENTISTS 

Doctors and dentists may only practise in France 
if possessed of diplomas issued upon the completion 
of certain courses in Government-appointed institu- 
tions. A degree from a foreign institution, of what- 
ever rank, carries no right to recognition in France 
save that these first conditions have been complied 
with. Such is the law as it exists to-day, though 
certain privileges and exemptions of certain formali- 
ties are sometimes made upon representation to the 
proper authorities. 

DIVORCE AND SEPARATION 

Separation is granted husband or wife by the courts 
by reason of the same causes as are admitted for 
divorce. This may be a concession to the Church, 
which does not admit of divorce, though in this con- 
nection there is, it must be remembered, no State Re- 
ligion in France; Catholics, Protestants, Jews and 
Mohammedans are alike before the law, though in 
the latter case a Mohammedan living in France may 
not practise polygamy, as he is allowed to by the 
tenets of his creed. 

DRUNKENNESS 

Drunkenness in France is punishable by fine if in 
public, and fine and imprisonment if repeated. The 
law differentiates though between occasional exuber- 
ance (ivresse) and habitual drunkenness (ivro- 
gnerie) . It is also punishable by fine if one sells 
drink to a person already the worse off for it, or to 
minors. A coutume, or local custom or usage, is 
current in most parts of France, which allows one the 



FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 515 

privilege of retracting within twenty-four hours any 
agreement made in a public drinking place. 
dressmakers' claims 
A dressmaker must give a customer a good and 
proper " fit." The higher price one pays, and the 
more exclusive the establishment patronised, the more 
exigent one is entitled to be as regards all details of 
style, workmanship, material, finish and fit, and the 
French courts may be expected to uphold any reason- 
able claims of a customer, a foreigner even, as against 
an establishment of this class. It is a question as to 
whether such a case is worth taking to court; pos- 
sibly not with regard to a small dressmaker working 
on her own account, but with regard to an establish- 
ment of undoubted financial responsibility, one has a 
fighting chance — if the case is well founded. A sine 
qua non is that you shall have agreed to pay what 
may be called a " fashionable price " for the garment 
in question; this implies (because in general such are 
admitted as excessive) the best of everything. If 
the couturier so much as substitutes satinette for silk, 
or bone buttons for ivory, if the former were agreed 
upon, his case may be expected to fall to the ground. 

DIVORCE 

Divorce in France is allowed for statutory causes 
on the part of husband or wife, violence, cruelty or 
insults, or the sentencing of either party to death, 
exile or penal servitude. Collusion in divorce pro- 
ceedings annuls all hope of judgment. Divorce evi- 
dence is not allowed to be published, and only public 
notice that divorce has been granted is allowed. A 



516 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

divorced person may not afterwards marry the co- 
respondent, and may not marry again in less than ten 
months. Children and grandchildren are not allowed 
to give testimony. 

DEATH OF A FOREIGNER IN FRANCE 

The death of a foreigner in France often causes 
much difficulty for friends and relatives in the time 
of most poignant sorrow. The American Consul 
should be advised immediately, thereby much annoy- 
ance may be saved. Death duties are payable to the 
French Government in some cases and not in others. 
Only one versed in such matters can decide the pro- 
cedure. If death occurs in a hotel, an indemnity is 
due the hotel keeper for derangement, or moral preju- 
dice, according to circumstances. This may be much 
or little, and may often be made a matter of arrange- 
ment. The personal belongings of the deceased are 
immediately put under seal by the Justice of the 
Peace, a formality which usually gives way before 
the representation of the authority of an American 
diplomatic or consular officer. 

DEATH DUTIES (DROITS DE SUCCESSION) 

Stocks, bonds and valuables of whatever kind, if 
kept in a safe deposit vault to which the original 
owner had a key, are not liable to the French death 
duties. Once the succession is regulated and the ex- 
ecutor having rights is recognised by the French 
authorities, the key and other property (which may 
have paid death duties) is turned over. What 
further fortune the turn of the key may bring to 
light is no concern of any one but the executor. 



FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 517 

FOREIGNERS IN FRANCE 

All persons living in French territory are subject 
to the laws of France, except with regard to personal 
property and his or her power to dispose of it by deed 
of gift or testament. 

FORWARDING OF MAIL MATTER 

Letters are bound to be forwarded to your new 
address by the concierge upon your leaving the build- 
ing where he is employed; he is also bound to reply 
to inquiries and give your new address to those who 
so demand, for a period of one year. As an extra 
precaution with regard to letters the Receveur Prin- 
cipal des Postes et Telegraphes should be notified of 
your change of address. 

FAMILY RIGHTS 

A Family Council may be instituted by law to 
safeguard general interests. The same institution 
is known under the Code Napoleon in Louisiana. 
The presiding officer is usually a local Juge de Paix. 

The rights of the paternal head of the family are 
absolute; a child remains under his authority until 
majority, and may not even leave the house (legally) 
without permission. 

Guardianship of the father over the personal estate 
of minor children is implied. If either father or 
mother dies the survivor becomes the guardian, who, 
upon decease, will presumably have appointed a legal 
guardian if the children are still minor. 

The ward's interests are not guaranteed by a bond, 
but by hypotheque legale of the property of the 



518 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

guardian, which amounts to practically the same 
thing. 

HOUSEHOLD SILVER 

If you choose to bring household silver to France 
for use in your Paris apartment, you must pay two 
francs a hundred grammes. Household effects in 
general should have a certificate of origin from the 
nearest French Consulate in America. 

HOTELS AND THEIR RESPONSIBILITY TOWARDS 
GUESTS 

Hotels and auberges are responsible depositories 
of the effects of their guests. The hotel keeper is 
responsible for theft or injury thereto, whether com- 
mitted by his employees or an outsider. Burglary, as 
an act of " superior force," gives a legal exemption. 

The hotel keeper has lien on the effects of the 
traveller for lodging and food and drink supplied, 
but only on the effects which the traveller may have 
brought with him to the hotel. The Statute of Lim- 
itations annuls the hotel keeper's claim after six 
months. 

The hotel register is bound to be kept by law, and 
is ever at the call and inspection of the police. The 
same regulation applies to lodging or boarding houses. 
A hotel keeper may not lodge more than twenty-four 
hours one who proves to have committed a criminal 
act during that time. The hotel register is thus re- 
quired to have the details of the guest inscribed 
thereon immediately upon arrival, name, age, nation- 
ality, profession, where last from, where bound. 



FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 519 

HOLIDAYS 

French legal holidays are Sundays; January 1; 
Christmas Day; Ascension Day; Easter Monday and 
Whit-Monday; Assumption; Toussaints, and the 
Fete Nationale — July 14th. 

HOTELS 

Baggage left at a hotel as security for a bill may 
be sold by public auction six months after the depar- 
ture of the traveller, any surplus being deposited for 
the latter's account in an appointed depository, where 
it remains for two years, after which it is acquired 
by the State. 

HOUSEHOLD EFFECTS (IMPORTATION OF) 

The bringing of household effects to France by a 
stranger who expects to reside there is possible only 
under certain restrictions. Household furniture, 
books, linen and clothing once used abroad are ad- 
mitted free for one's personal use. If any consider- 
able quantity is involved a visit should be paid to 
the French consul at the point of departure and a 
certificate of service, which will cost but a trifle, be 
taken, if one can be obtained. This will, in a way, 
establish origin and bona fides. The assay rights on 
household silver and gold will have to be paid if any 
but the slightest volume of such is brought; twenty 
francs a kilo on silver and three hundred and seventy- 
five francs a kilo on gold. 

EDUCATION 

Education is obligatory in France for boys and 
girls from six to thirteen years of age. Instruction 



520 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

may be at public or private schools, or even at the 
home of the father. 

GAMBLING DEBTS 

Gambling debts are not admitted to process of 
law, save with exceptions referring to " sport." Bil- 
liards and card playing do not come in that category. 

INFECTIOUS DISEASES 

In case of suspicion of an infectious disease having 
taken place in an apartment about to be hired, the 
landlord may be compelled to have it disinfected by 
the public health authorities, otherwise you are privi- 
leged to cancel your lease. 

IDENTIFICATION 

The average American travels, and often lives, 
abroad without any official documentary identifica- 
tion. A passport should be in the possession of every 
one travelling or living abroad. This, in the absence 
of any other pieces d'identite, for which the French 
authorities so often ask, will prove useful and even 
valuable on many occasions. 

LEGITIMATISING OF CHILDREN 

A father may recognise and legitimatise a child 
without even the tacit admission of the mother. The 
French law is liberal and simple. Recognition is 
made legal by an Acte Authentique de Reconnaissance , 
which is stamped and registered by the authorities 
free of charge. No woman may claim paternity for 
any child born out of wedlock; this with exceptions. 
The subject is a vast one, but not complicated. The 
law favours the better instincts of humanity and is 
generally so recognised. 



FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 521 

LOST AND FOUND 

Lost property if found is supposed to be delivered 
in Paris to the Bureau des Objets Trouves, elsewhere 
at the Hotel de Ville. A form is filled up, a receipt 
given, and affairs run their course, when, under cer- 
tain reservations, the object is ultimately given to the 
finder, if no owner appears. If one buys lost prop- 
erty, he must, in case the owner appears, give it up 
on reimbursement of the sum paid. This presumes 
that there has been no collusion or fraud, and that 
the article was bought in good faith. 

LAW OF LIMITATIONS 

The French Law of Limitations — after which one 
may not be sued for debt — varies as to whether the 
dealings are by persons in trade or between a trades- 
man and an individual. A milliner or a dressmaker 
produces one of those ravishing confections for an 
American customer, who, living on her income, occu- 
pies an apartment in the Etoile quarter, and for some 
reason or other, because it was not as ordered, because 
the dress did not fit or what not, refuses payment, 
the individual may not be sued for the bill after 
two years have passed. The French Civil Code 
(Feb. 26, 1911) thus "outlaws" such transactions. 
This applies as well to doctors' and dentists' bills. 

Between merchants doing business along similar, 
or different lines, prescription comes under another 
ruling. Notes and Bills of Exchange, etc., are only 
outlawed after five years. 

The accounts of a professor or teacher of the sci- 
ences or arts, for lessons given, are outlawed in six 



522 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

months, as are also those of hotel and restaurant 
keepers, for board and lodging furnished, and of 
labourers and work people for their day's wages and 
material supplied. 

The accounts of servants who hire themselves out 
by the year, and of boarding-school teachers, are out- 
lawed within one year. 

Within two years, limitation applies to the bills of 
doctors, surgeons, dentists and chemists. The bills 
of doctors are legally due when a patient recovers, 
or dies. This would seem to offer much subject for 
discussion, but the fact, as it is generally understood, 
is stated nevertheless. Lawyers' fees are, according 
to the same reasoning, or custom, due when judgment 
is obtained, or a compromise between the parties 
interested arrived at. 

A general statute provides for general limitation 
at thirty years, but legal matters in which judges or 
lawyers are appointed as trustees and the like are 
supposed to be settled within five years, at which date, 
notes, bills of exchange, etc., signed by merchants or 
traders, are annulled by automatic prescription. 

LEASES OF HOUSES OR APARTMENTS — (BAIL) 

One salient point should be observed first of all, 
and that is the condition of the house or apartment 
{etat de lieux) upon taking possession. Unless it 
is so expressly stated in writing, the lessee is supposed 
to have received the property in good condition, and 
must so leave it. The expense of a survey, or the act 
of compiling an etat de lieux is usually shared equally 
by the lessee and lessor. 



FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 523 

The rent (loyer) is supposed to be guaranteed by 
the lessee having possession in his own right and in 
placing in the apartment sufficient furniture. The 
landlord, through his concierge, or by other means, 
may forbid the removal of any furniture if any por- 
tion of the rental remains unpaid. Sureties may be 
entered into for the amount of the rental, or a deposit 
may be made by the lessee in some bank in the name 
of the lessor, as a guarantee, in which case, by local 
custom — not law — the interest on the sum so depos- 
ited belongs to the lessor. 

A hired piano or other article of furniture could 
secure exemption by an agreement in writing, signed 
by all the parties concerned, but such an arrangement 
would not apply to a general outfit of hired furniture, 
unless the lessor was otherwise secured. 

MOURNING 

The periods of full mourning in France (Paris) 
are one year for a widow or widower; nine months 
for father, mother, father-in-law, or mother-in-law; 
six months for a child, son-in-law, daughter-in-law, 
grandparents, brother, sister, brother-in-law, sister-in- 
law. Half mourning follows for nine months in the 
case of a widow or widower; six months for father, 
mother, father-in-law, mother-in-law, and three 
months for other members of the family. 

MAJORITY, OR COMING OF AGE 

Majority comes automatically to boys and girls 
at the age of twenty-one, when, so far as all civil acts 
are concerned, they are no longer minors. As to 



524 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

marriage, all males must have completed their eigh- 
teenth year, and females their fifteenth, but consent 
of the parents must be obtained in the case of the 
man up to twenty-five years of age, and of woman up 
to twenty-one. Failing the latter, the formality 
known as an acte de respecte absolves them from the 
necessity of parental permission. 

METRIC SYSTEM OF WEIGHTS AND MEASURES 

The metric system is alone legal in France. Any 
one who may expect to have general dealings with 
French tradesmen or institutions should provide him- 
self with a set of these tables and their American 
equivalents in weights and measures. The system is 
simple, practical and thoroughly applicable to all 
transactions whereby are usually applied our own 
rather complicated system of computation. 

MONEY (CURRENT COINS AND BANK NOTES ) 

The gold of Belgium, Italy, Switzerland, Greece, 
Austria and Tunisia passes current in France, and the 
gold and silver of Belgium and Switzerland. Papal 
States coinage is no longer current, nor is the divi- 
sionary coinage of Greece, as was the case until quite 
recently. Small silver coinage, certain of the Napo- 
leon effigy without the laurel crown, the coins of the 
reign of Louis XVIII and some others, are now 
demonetised. In general all the five-franc or five- 
livre pieces of the European powers are current in 
France, but no bank-notes except those of the Bank 
of France. An English sovereign is usually accepted 
by shops and hotels at twenty-five francs, and a five 



FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 525 

dollar gold coin ought to bring between twenty-five 
francs fifty centimes and twenty-six francs. Copper 
coins are not legal tender beyond five francs, and no 
one is obliged to make change for a bank-note. 

MONEY (COUNTERFEIT) 

False money is a thing for strangers to beware of 
in Europe. Once accepted you have no redress 
against one who gave it to you, but he must not refuse 
to give you another piece for any you may be justly 
suspicious of when you are actually completing a 
transaction. If he refuses it is an affair for the police. 

MARRIAGE 

The institution of French marriage is based on the 
family. The question of the mercenary " dot " is 
not to be considered here, but the endowing of a 
daughter, and often a son, is a tenet of the French 
family creed. It is not obligatory by law, but is 
usual. 

Marriages between brothers and sisters-in-law, 
though tacitly forbidden, is often to be arranged by 
personal appeal to the President of the Republic. 
Marriage is a public institution and must be cele- 
brated before a civil officer, the Maire of the Com- 
mune; whether a religious marriage follows or not 
is optional. Public notice to the effect that a mar- 
riage is to take place must be posted on the notice 
board of the Mairie, or town hall, and the exhibit- 
ing of a birth certificate, or an " acte de notoriete," 
in the absence of the former, is necessary, as well as 
the written consent of the parents (or its substitute 



526 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

in case the former is not possible), as well as a public 
acknowledgment of the terms of the marriage settle- 
ment. 

American diplomatic or consular officers may not 
officiate at the marriage of those of their nationality, 
as may their colleagues in the British service, but 
they may, upon request, be witnesses of the marriage, 
at an appropriate fee, which is regulated by the legal 
list of consular fees, and the same may be recorded 
in the records of the consulate upon the payment of 
the legal fee as well. 

A woman married under the French law must 
obey her husband, is obliged to live with him, and 
where he may decide. With the authority of her 
husband she may carry on business and make con- 
tracts as if she were single, but may not go to law 
except with his specific consent or that of the courts. 
If her husband is poor and she has financial means, 
she is obliged to aid him, and she cannot, as an in- 
dividual, transfer any property which she may pos- 
sess without his assent. 

The subject is a very vast and important one, and 
any one interested, for any reason whatever, should 
take every means of supplying themselves with thor- 
ough information on the subject if they would avoid 
pitfalls and unthought-of circumstances and condi- 
tions. 

From a sentimental point, the French law does not 
recognise a breach of promise; only in case of material 
loss, as for the purchase of a trousseau, expense of a 
journey, or what not of a like nature, has a jilted 



FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 527 

young woman any recourse or hope of the gain of 
" damages." 

NOBILITY 

The French titles of nobility are a hereditary dis- 
tinction. Such existing titles as one meets with are 
descended from a time anterior to the meeting of the 
National Assembly of 1789 — which abolished them 
by decree — or from the new nobility erected by Napo- 
leon in 1806, or the Restoration of Louis XVIII. 
Various abolishments came into operation, but cer- 
tainly such things as existed cannot be abolished, and 
so with some reasoning descendants put forth their 
pretensions, which, however, are not legally recog- 
nised, and may practically be considered courtesy 
titles. 

NEWSPAPER STATEMENTS — LIBELOUS OR NOT 

Newspaper mention, by error, of any act or fault 
improperly attributable to an individual, is bound to 
be corrected by the owner of the paper upon request 
of the grieved party, by gratuitous insertion of the 
correction within three days after having received 
such request. 

NEWSBOYS 
A newsboy in France may not shout false news in 
order to sell his papers. A leather-lunged newsboy 
(of perhaps twenty-five years of age) shouted: 
" Great Catastrophe on the Underground," when 
there was nothing that had happened to justify such 
a procedure. He was arrested, admonished and 
fined. 



528 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 
NATURALISATION 

A foreigner may become naturalised a French sub- 
ject, and enjoy all the privileges of the French, but 
he may not be eligible to legislative assemblies until 
ten years later. Naturalisation applies only to the 
individual, not to his wife and children, without a 
separate procedure. 

NOTARIES 

A Notaire in France does not exactly correspond 
to a Notary Public. Protests are made in France 
by Huissiers. A French Notary may, under certain 
conditions, administer an oath to be made use of on 
a document in the United States, but his signature 
and seal should be certified by a United States diplo- 
matic or consular officer located in France, under 
which circumstances it would have been better to 
have had the notarial act performed by such officer 
in the first instance. 

LOST AND FOUND PROPERTY 

Treasure trove, i.e., objects found on one's own 
property belong to the owner of that property; if 
found on the property of another — in a hired house, 
apartment or garden — half value belongs to the finder 
and half to the owner of the property. 

PROFESSIONAL SECRECY 

Professional secrecy is provided for by law. A 
doctor, lawyer, clergyman, etc., may not reveal in- 
formation which has been confided to them in the 
way of their professional duties, except as to liability 
to a fine or imprisonment, or both. 



FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 529 

FRENCH PROPERTY 

A foreigner owning property in France is subject 
to attachment in law if a suit goes against him in 
France. 

PROFESSIONAL ENGAGEMENTS 

Actors, musicians and singers are engaged upon 
written agreement, with usually the right of the im- 
pressario to annul said agreement if the artist does 
not " take," a fine distinction and one fraught with 
considerable possible difficulty. After the first ap- 
pearances, and assuming that they are successful, the 
engagement holds good for the full term of the 
agreement, and the salary has to be paid whether the 
services are made use of or not. If hired for a cer- 
tain role, and once having played it, an actress cannot 
refuse to play it further without abrogating the con- 
tract. Continued illness releases the manager from 
the obligation to pay salary, but not a temporary ill- 
ness. Pregnancy is not recognised as an illness under 
normal conditions. 

PAWNSHOPS (MONT DE PIETe) 

The government pawnshop, or Mont de Piete, 
is a well organised and well conducted institution, 
though of course there is the same sense of personal 
fall in pride in dealing therewith, as with the most 
rapacious usurer. Loans are made for one year, with 
interest at three per cent, plus another three per cent 
for expenses, and a further tax of one per cent, in all 
seven per cent. Sales are made upon the claim of 
the borrower after three months, or by law, during 



530 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

the thirteenth month, if the pledge is not redeemed, 
any excess going to the borrower after the deduction 
of the additional expenses which are provided for 
and regulated by law. 

TELEGRAMS 

Telegrams, the sending of which is a government 
monopoly in France, may be written on the forms 
supplied at the post-office for the purpose, or any 
white blank paper. Cablegrams may be written on 
the printed forms supplied by the cable companies, 
and should be accepted by all post-office telegraph 
bureaux, though they are sometimes wrongly refused. 

TIPS (POURBOIRES) 

These are regulated more by custom than anything 
else, and are only treated here as they apply to domi- 
cile, or residence, rather than for the thousand and 
one occasions — restaurants, tea-rooms, the paying for 
personal service wherever expected, and the like. 

From the domestic side, then, the coachman who 
takes you from the railway station to your house or 
hotel expects a tip of twenty-five centimes above his 
legal fare. When you pay a bill of the grocer or 
the baker, you are supposed to give the employee 
who presents it at least two sous. Servants at coun- 
try houses where you may be invited are grateful if 
remembered at the rate of a franc a day, or five francs 
as a total if the stay is but a few days. The withered 
old party who shows you to your seat or box at the 
opera expects from fifty centimes to a franc. Your 
concierge will expect from ten to fifty francs as 



FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 531 

etrennes at the New Year, and all employees of 
tradesmen who have served you the previous twelve- 
month, personal servants and domestics, will expect 
also their New Year's gift of from ten to twenty- 
five francs and upwards. 

TAXES 

Taxes for the foreigner in France are a compli- 
cated procedure. One pays an indirect tax on salt, 
matches, etc., and a direct tax on automobiles, dogs, 
real estate, house rent, for doors and windows, for 
doing business, for the founding of a club or society, 
etc. There is also the octroi tax, which is paid on 
all comestibles, and many other things besides, which 
are brought into most of the cities, towns and vil- 
lages of France. This is a very considerable tax in 
Paris, though it seldom is levied against the individual 
personally, save as you may have made an excursion 
to the country, and the happy idea struck you to bring 
back a dozen really country eggs. Then you pay 
as you leave the railway station, or pass the Porte 
Maillot, or by whatever means you may enter the 
city. 

The tenant's tax in Paris is one per cent on the 
rent value and is imposed upon the tenant. Rent 
value of less than five hundred francs secures exemp- 
tion. These taxes are payable by twelve monthly 
instalments, or as a total, at the choice of the tenant. 

STORAGE OF FURNITURE OR PERSONAL EFFECTS 

There are government-recognised warehouses 
where goods, and under certain aspects, personal 



532 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

effects, furniture, trunks and the like, may be stored 
against a proper receipt or warrant. This docu- 
ment, under certain conditions, is negotiable, and on 
it money may even be borrowed. This is quite apart 
from the function of the government pawnshop, or 
Mont de Piete. 

STAMPED PAPER ( PAPIER TIMBRE ) 

Legal documents and petitions are generally re- 
quired to be drawn up on Papier Timbre. The doc- 
ument is invalid otherwise. Such stamped paper is 
usually to be had at the larger tobacco shops, and, 
like stamps, tobacco and cigars, is sold as a govern- 
ment monopoly. 

STOCKS AND BONDS 

Gifts of stocks or bonds, real or personal property, 
etc., between living parties (inter vivos) should be 
registered under some form of notarial act. Gifts 
from hand to hand, of a watch or jewelry, of an 
automobile possibly (dons manuels) , require no such 
document. A married woman (a Frenchwoman or 
any other living under French law) may not receive 
an inter vivos gift save by her husband's consent, or 
the authority of the French courts. 

SUNDAY LAW 

Sundays are public holidays in France, but private 
business so transacted, including formal agreements, 
etc., are valid if performed on that day. 

SHOPS AND SHOPPING 

Avoid disputes, their settlement is a seemingly in- 
terminable affair. Receipts should be taken for 



FRENCH LAW FOR FOREIGNERS 533 

every payment or purchase made, above all from a 
dealer with whom you may at one time or another 
have had a credit account. These receipts are valua- 
ble records. Keep them. A ten-centime " quit- 
tance" stamp is required by law to be placed on all 
receipts, and involves a fine against payer and payee 
in case of omission. A dealer is bound to deliver the 
same goods which he offers, and to guarantee them 
as represented, though if offered " with defects," and 
so accepted by the purchaser, they cannot at a later 
time (of delivery) be refused. In the case of unseen 
defects — vices caches — the responsibility rests with the 
seller. All big establishments have a " claims " de- 
partment, but it is conducted in their own interests, 
though nominally bound by certain observations of 
impartiality imposed by law. 

SERVANTS 

The servant question is not easily or briefly han- 
dled. Female servants from the country are very 
numerous in Paris, as are Swiss. One may often 
learn of servants looking for engagements at the 
Mairie, or town hall, of the Arrondissement, and 
there are also private employment agencies (Bureaux 
de Placement). Domestic service seems to be at a 
discount for young girls, who, in Paris as elsewhere, 
are taking up with shop and factory work. Wine 
and washing are usually supplied a servant, or, in 
lieu thereof, a cash indemnity is allowed. Servants 
pay the Bureau de Placement a fixed fee, after a situ- 
ation has been obtained, and after a sufficient time has 



534 THE AMERICAN WOMAN ABROAD 

passed to allow of her having been able to earn the 
sum in her new position. Servants remaining away 
from their employer's establishment overnight may 
be summarily discharged. Servants are generally en- 
gaged under verbal agreement, but it is incumbent 
upon the employer to keep a strict written record of 
money transactions with servants, as his word is usu- 
ally accepted as final if supported with plausible book- 
keeping records. An engagement can be broken, for 
cause, with a servant, on eight days' notice, usually 
by the payment of eight days' wages and packing them 
off. In case of bad service the servant cannot de- 
mand a written character, but may demand a certifi- 
cate giving the date of entrance and leaving his, or 
her, employer's service. A servant may not pledge 
the credit of his employer for even necessaries for the 
house. 

WINDOW BOXES FOR FLOWERS 

If one keeps flowers on balconies and in window 
boxes, the watering of them, or the knocking of them 
or their pots off accidentally into the streets, incurs 
liability for damage by the offender. 

WILLS 

A holograph will — one wholly in the writing of 
the testator — if witnessed by three persons, who 
should give their addresses, should be acceptable for 
probate to authorities in the United States, and would 
be recognised by the French authorities, if need be, 
under article 970 of the French Civil Code. 



lBMy'26 



